Do California landlords have to offer tenants rent reporting to credit bureaus?
Most do. California Civil Code 1954.07 requires landlords to offer each tenant the option of having their on-time rent payments reported to at least one nationwide consumer reporting agency (a credit bureau), at the start of the lease and at least once a year. A building of 15 or fewer units is exempt unless the owner has more than one building and is a REIT, a corporation or an LLC with a corporate member. Any fee is capped at the lesser of the landlord's actual cost or $10 a month.
Does it apply to you? A quick decision guide
- Is the unit residential rental property in California? If not, this section does not apply.
- Does the building have 15 or fewer units? If no, you must offer reporting for that building.
- If yes: does the landlord own more than one residential rental building and is it a real estate investment trust, a corporation, or an LLC with at least one corporate member? If yes, you must offer it. If no, that building is exempt.
Example a made-up owner holds a 12 unit building in one LLC and a 40 unit building in another, and both LLCs have only individual people as members. The 12 unit building is exempt because it has 15 or fewer units and the owner is not a REIT, corporation or LLC with a corporate member. The 40 unit building is not exempt, so its tenants must get the offer.
The wording of the exemption is in subdivision (j) of Civil Code 1954.07. If your ownership chain includes a corporation, read it closely or ask your attorney.
When the offer has to be made
| Lease | First offer | After that |
|---|---|---|
| Signed on or after April 1, 2025 | At the time of the lease agreement | At least once a year |
| Already in place on January 1, 2025 | No later than April 1, 2025 | At least once a year |
A simple way to stay on schedule is to make the offer in the lease packet for new tenants and attach the yearly offer to each renewal, so every tenant hears it at least once in every 12 months.
What gets reported, and the fee
The statute is about positive rental payment information: a tenant's complete, timely rent payments. It does not cover reporting late or partial payments under this section.
You may charge the tenant who opts in a fee, but it can be no more than the lesser of your actual cost to provide the service or $10 a month. If the service costs you nothing, you may charge nothing.
Example a made-up 40 unit building uses a reporting service that costs the owner $6.50 per enrolled tenant per month. Nine tenants opt in. The owner may charge each $6.50, not $10, for a total of $58.50 a month. If the service cost $12 per tenant, the owner could charge no more than $10 and would carry the other $2.
If the tenant stops paying the fee, or wants out
- Not paying the reporting fee is not a reason to end the tenancy.
- You may not take the unpaid fee out of the security deposit.
- If the fee is unpaid for 30 days or more, you may stop reporting. The tenant then cannot sign up again for six months from when the fee first became due.
- A tenant may ask in writing to stop the reporting, and you must stop. They cannot sign up again for at least six months.
Keep the reporting fee as its own line on the tenant's ledger, separate from rent. That way a missed $6.50 never looks like short rent, and it never triggers a late fee or a rent notice.
Setting it up in five steps
- Decide, building by building, whether you must offer it using the guide above.
- Pick a reporting service and write down its actual cost per tenant, since that sets your fee ceiling.
- Write a one-page offer: what is reported (on-time payments), to which bureau, the monthly fee, and how to opt out.
- Give it with every new lease and once a year to every tenant, and keep a copy of each signed choice.
- Add the fee as a separate charge for tenants who opt in, and stop it when they opt out.
How DoorKeeping supports it
DoorKeeping keeps every tenant's ledger in the property's own books, so you have a clean record of on-time payments to share with the reporting service you choose. You can email the yearly offer to every tenant of a building, include it in an e-signed lease or renewal, and keep the signed choices with the property's documents. Separate ledger lines keep the fee apart from rent. All of it is in the $2 per unit monthly price.
Sources
- California Civil Code section 1954.07, read Oct 30, 2026
Questions
- Are small California landlords exempt from rent reporting?
- A building with 15 or fewer units is exempt, unless the landlord owns more than one residential rental building and is a REIT, a corporation or an LLC with at least one corporate member.
- How much can a California landlord charge for rent reporting?
- The lesser of the landlord's actual cost or $10 a month. If the landlord pays nothing for the service, it may charge nothing.
- Can a landlord report late rent under this law?
- Section 1954.07 is about positive rental payment information: complete, timely payments. It does not cover late or partial payments.