Rental Application and Tenant-Screening Fee Requirements in Nevada
At a glance
| Governing law and coverage | NRS 118A.080, 118A.100, 118A.180, and 118A.306; landlords charging prospective tenants to apply for covered Nevada dwelling units; chapter exclusions apply |
|---|---|
| Fees allowed or prohibited | No general adult-applicant fee ban in § 118A.306; application, credit-report, and background-check fees are all barred for a minor household member (§ 118A.306(1)-(3)) |
| Maximum charge and adjustment | No statewide numeric, actual-cost, customary-cost, per-applicant, per-household, or indexed ceiling in §§ 118A.235 and 118A.306 |
| Permitted costs and charge timing | No cost-component or precollection timing rule; refund if the unit is rented to someone else and the paid activity was not performed (§ 118A.306(1)) |
| Before-screening disclosures | No fee, criteria, unit-availability, or report-source precharge disclosure; on request, landlord/agent must give the prospective tenant the would-be written rental agreement (§ 118A.235) |
| Receipt, report copy, and refund | No application-stage receipt or screening-report-copy duty; the paid fee is refunded on the two-part trigger, with no statutory deadline (§ 118A.306(1)) |
| Applicant-supplied or reusable reports | No applicant-supplied or reusable screening-report acceptance or no-fee procedure |
| Application order and adverse action | No first-in-order, first-qualified, single-application, screening-criteria, or state denial-reason notice process |
| Remedies and stronger local rules | Mandatory refund and minor-fee ban; no fee-specific damages, penalty, cure, attorney-fee, or local-preemption clause stated in § 118A.306 |
Nevada's two application-stage rules
Nevada Revised Statutes § 118A.306 regulates any fee collected from a prospective tenant "to apply to rent a dwelling unit." Its examples include an application fee, a fee for a credit report, and a fee for a background check. The section does not set a dollar maximum, actual-cost limit, customary-cost ceiling, or annual adjustment for an adult applicant.
The refund rule requires both of these events:
- the landlord rents the dwelling unit to a different prospective tenant; and
- the landlord does not perform the activity for which the fee was collected, such as processing the application or obtaining the promised report.
When both are true, the landlord must refund the fee. Section 118A.306 does not state when that refund must be made. If the landlord performed the paid activity, renting the unit to someone else does not by itself satisfy the statutory refund test.
The second rule is categorical. A landlord may not collect an application, credit-report, or background-check fee for a minor who is a member of the prospective tenant's household. Subsection (3) defines a minor as someone under 18 and defines the household as people living in the same home or dwelling who are related by blood, adoption, marriage, or domestic partnership.
Proposed rental agreement available on request
NRS 118A.235 supplies the application-stage disclosure that appears in this chapter. On request, the landlord or agent must give a prospective tenant a copy of the written rental agreement, if one exists, that would govern if the person became a tenant.
The audited provisions do not require a separate precharge notice of the application fee, unit availability, screening criteria, information categories, or consumer-reporting agency. They also establish no application-stage receipt, screening-report-copy, reusable-report, application-order, or state denial- reason procedure. Separate federal consumer-reporting duties may still apply.
Coverage and remedies
Chapter 118A covers dwelling units in Nevada subject to its listed exclusions. The exclusions in § 118A.180(2) include, among other arrangements, manufactured-home-park rental agreements governed by chapter 118B, public-housing-authority low-rent programs, specified institutional residences, short hotel or motel occupancy without a manifested longer-stay intent, and primarily agricultural premises.
Section 118A.306 itself provides the refund command and the minor-fee prohibition. It does not state a fee-specific damages amount, civil penalty, cure period, attorney-fee rule, or local-preemption clause.
What trips people up
A rejected applicant is not automatically owed a refund. The unit must be rented to someone else and the landlord must have failed to perform the activity for which the fee was collected.
The statute provides no refund clock. It says the landlord "shall refund" the fee when the two conditions are met but gives no number of days.
Common questions
Does calling the charge a processing fee avoid the statute? No. Section 118A.306 reaches "any fee" to apply, and processing the application is one of its examples of the activity for which a fee may have been collected.
What if one charge was supposed to pay for several screening tasks? The statute ties the refund to the activity for which the fee was collected but does not state an allocation rule for partly completed work. The fee's stated purpose and what the landlord actually did therefore matter.
Does an unrelated minor who plans to live in the unit fit this definition of household? Not under § 118A.306(3)'s definition, which requires both living in the same home or dwelling and a relationship by blood, adoption, marriage, or domestic partnership.
Statutes and sources
- Nev. Rev. Stat. §§ 118A.080, 118A.100, and 118A.180 — dwelling unit,
landlord, coverage, and exclusions.
"Landlord" means a person who provides a dwelling unit for occupancy by another pursuant to a rental agreement.
Official source: https://www.leg.state.nv.us/nrs/nrs-118a.html (accessed 2026-07-21) - Nev. Rev. Stat. § 118A.235 — proposed rental agreement on request.
A landlord or his or her agent shall, upon request, provide to a prospective tenant a copy of the written rental agreement, if any, to which the prospective tenant would be subject if he or she were to become a tenant.
Official source: https://www.leg.state.nv.us/nrs/nrs-118a.html (accessed 2026-07-21) - Nev. Rev. Stat. § 118A.306(1) — conditional fee refund.
A landlord who collects from a prospective tenant any fee to apply to rent a dwelling unit ... shall refund the fee ... if the landlord: (a) Rents the dwelling unit to a different prospective tenant; and (b) Does not conduct the activity for which the fee was collected ...
Official source: https://www.leg.state.nv.us/nrs/nrs-118a.html (accessed 2026-07-21) - Nev. Rev. Stat. § 118A.306(2)-(3) — minor-household-member prohibition and definitions.
A landlord shall not collect an application fee, a fee to obtain a credit report or a fee to obtain a background check for a minor who is a member of the household of the prospective tenant.
Official source: https://www.leg.state.nv.us/nrs/nrs-118a.html (accessed 2026-07-21)
Source links
Every statute quoted above, linked, with the date we checked it.
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