Understanding the Rent Control Ballot Question Compromise: Full Text Explained

Any law in housing should protect tenants and housing providers both.

If the state Legislature (senators and representatives) votes for this compromise, this is what will become law. The ballot question will not appear on the November 2026 ballot.

Under current law, Chapter 40P prohibits rent control unless it is compensated by the city or town that enacts it. If the Legislature approves the compromise, Chapter 40P will no longer exist. The ballot question was also trying to get rid of Chapter 40P.

The compromise creates a new chapter, Chapter 40Z, for the new rent control law that will replace Chapter 40P. The new wording for Chapter 40Z follows.

Section 1. Cities or towns can choose to adopt rent control. If they do, they must accept all of the law as written. They cannot pick and choose which terms to adopt.

If a city or town chooses to adopt rent control, they have six months to enact it and create a local bylaw or ordinance to administer it.

Section 2. This explains how a city of town can enact rent control if they want. They can simply enact a local ordinance allowing it. The city or town council can approve it by majority vote. Or they can put it on the ballot as a local question in an election.

Section 3. This section explains what kinds of housing units would not have to follow rent control laws.

1. Owner-occupied rentals that have four units or less. Since an LLC or trust is not a person, it cannot occupy a building, and so LLC- and trust-owned buildings are subject to rent control.

2. Projects are not rent-controlled. However, Section 8 mobile housing vouchers will no longer pay fair market rent. Section 8 will pay controlled rent.

3. Hospitals, mental health facilities, and rehabilitation facilities are not subject to rent control.

4. Nursing homes or assisted living places are not subject to rent control.
5. School dorms are not subject to rent control. We interpret this to mean university dorms and boarding school dorms.

6. Housing operated for religious purposes is exempt from rent control. This is the exception that stood out as questionable during the SJC hearing on whether the ballot question was constitutional. The compromise can exempt any dwelling simply because it is used for religious purposes.

Note: Religious purpose is not religious ownership. One major loophole we foresee is landlords declaring that they have found new faith as a rental housing provider and claiming bogus exemptions.

7. Short-term rentals of 14 days are less are exempt from rent control. Anything longer makes the unit subject to rent control. Owners with vacation rentals will not be able to rent for longer than two weeks at a time. This could make off-season renting more difficult, especially if the person refuses to leave when summer comes. More on that later.

8. Non-profits are exempt from rent control.

Note: Non-profit ownership is not required. Any for-profit landlord could set up a nonprofit to operate their property for non-profit purposes. Non-profit does not mean non-salary.

Remember the exemption for religion? Most religious institutions are non-profit, at least on paper. It’s strange they carved out a special exception for religion when “non-profit” would cover most of them. If you are for-profit religion, should you be allowed to dodge rent control? Apparently so.

9. If a rental already has a rent cap or income restriction in place, it is not subject to rent control. This exempts affordable housing, income-restricted housing and housing with maximum rents.

10. If a housing project received funding through a program that provides tax credits for creating income-restricted housing, it is not subject to rent control. New housing created under these programs would not have to become rent-controlled after 15 years, like other new housing will. (More on that later.)

11. Under certain circumstances, housing projects that are financed or operated by public housing agencies, EOHLC or other state/local housing providers, are exempt from rent control. This includes buildings where some of the units are income-restricted and others are not.

These are the conditions for such places to be exempt:

11-1. At least 60% of the rental units on the property are permanently restricted to a certain rent that was set by the public agency that operates it. The households living in those units cannot have an income that is higher than 60% of the average income for the area, which is set by the state. These properties would be exempt from rent control, even the units that are not restricted. OR

11-2. At least 40% of the rental units on the property are permanently restricted to a certain rent that was set by the public agency that operates it. The households living in those units cannot have an income that is higher than 30% of the average income for the area, which is set by the state. These properties would be exempt from rent control, even the units that are not restricted.

12. Other deed-restricted properties that are not run or financed by the government may be exempt under certain conditions. This is valid for as long as the properties are deed-restricted, or until the exemption for new construction is up, whichever is longer.

Here are the conditions:

12-1. The whole property is exempt as long as at least 60% of the rental units on the property are restricted to certain residents paying a certain affordable rent (it’s not clear what determines “affordable” here). Those residents cannot make more than 60% of the average rent for the area, as determined by the state. OR

12-2. The whole property is exempt as long as at least 40% of the rental units on the property are restricted to certain residents paying a certain affordable rent (again, it’s not clear what determines “affordable”). Those residents cannot make more than 40% of the average rent for the area, as determined by the state.

13. New construction is exempt for 15 years. The ballot question limited it to 10 years; this is an increase to encourage developers to build more, because rent control notoriously kills housing production. A longer grace period in Maryland still didn’t help their housing production, though.

14. Units in an existing building may also be exempt for 15 years but only if:

• There was no certificate of occupancy for 5 years before (in other words, no one would have been allowed to live there) AND
• The owner puts at least 40% of the building’s value into renovation to get it up to code so it can get a certificate of occupancy.

Note: This exemption would apply even if someone were living in a condemned unit and the owner were collecting rent. This creates a perverse incentive to have properties condemned and then re-rent them on the black market. This exemption should be reworded.

1. If you have a unit that is not rent-controlled, you have to let the renters know that when you give them their lease. We’re guessing they also mean month-to-month rental agreements. If you do not have a written lease, your tenants at will must get the notice before you take the first rent payment.

Note: Just like in the security deposit law, your failure to complete the paperwork correctly may subject you to triple damages as if you were rent controlled. This is true even if the mistake was in good faith and you really are exempt from rent control.

Section 4: Rent increase limits for non-exempt properties

1. Cities and towns can enact rent control. Rent increase limits for any building not exempt in Section 3(a) must match the rent increase limits set each year by EOHLC. Cities and towns cannot create a lower or higher rent increase limit. They must follow EOHLC limits.

Note: The law is silent as to whether the town can require advance notice. During the rent control years, requirements for advance notice were often used to delay rent increases indefinitely.

This is higher than the ballot question, which limited rent increases to inflation or 5%, whichever is lower. This law caps rent increases at inflation plus 5%, or a total of 10%, whichever is lower.

This is not helpful for renters, who could see increases of $250 a month on a “cheap” Boston apartment that rents for $2,500 at lease signing.

Like the ballot question, the compromise does not state which inflation index will be used to determine the starting number.

1. Rental housing providers cannot exceed the rent increase cap. They can choose to not increase the rent, or increase it by a lower amount than the cap. Under this kind of rent control, the most common landlord behavior is that landlords raise the rent by the maximum each year because future rent increases are uncertain to keep pace with high inflation.

1. If your renters have a lease, whatever rent you were charging six months before your city or town adopts rent control is your base rent. Your next annual increase will be calculated off of that amount.

If there was no lease in place six months before rent control gets adopted, whatever rent you were charging without a lease at that point is the base for future increases. This would include tenants at will.

1. If your renter moves out, base rent is calculated differently. This is where “vacancy decontrol” comes into play, but there are rules. Read on.

Section 5: Eviction rules for rent-controlled properties

This is what the corporations negotiating with the rent control advocates gave up in exchange for the loosened rent cap and vacancy decontrol.

1. You cannot evict anymore for “no fault,” also known as “no cause stated.” The problem with this is, some of the reasons you can evict are very hard to prove in court. “No fault” evictions are often used by small landlords who cannot easily prove the rental agreement violation.

Corporations with big in-house counsel and staff managers can handle a long court case. Mom-and-pop landlords cannot. That’s why small landlords rely on “no fault” evictions to remove a renter who is at fault.

These are the only reasons landlords can evict under rent control:

1. The renter does not pay rent.
2. You increase the rent within the allowed limit, and your renter does not want to pay it.
3. You are removing the unit from the rental market to convert it to a condo. There are existing laws governing how you can do that.

4. You want to tear down the building, convert it to commercial or industrial use, use it as your primary residence, or have an immediate family member use it as their primary residence.

We take this to mean you cannot remove your renter because you want to use it as a vacation home a couple of months out of the year, because that would not be your primary residence.

5. Your renter commits a major rental agreement violation.

This disrespects most rental agreement clauses, rendering them invalid unless the rent board considers the clause “substantial.” What may be a nightmare for other residents in the building could easily be found “not substantial” by a rent board, who don’t have to live next to their bad decisions.

6. Your renter is committing a crime on the property, or acting in a criminally dangerous way toward other people on the property.

Note: Activities and behaviors that do not rise to the level of a crime don’t count.

7. Your renter is creating a “public nuisance,” which are the specific behaviors identified in General Law Chapter 139.

8. Your tenant causes major damage to their rental unit or the building itself. This could be hard to prove as well – how do you know for sure that tenant did it? What is “substantial damage,” exactly? A rent board would likely disagree with your assessment of what is substantial simply because they won’t be personally responsible for repairing the damage.

1. If your unit is completely vacant and you start a new tenancy, you can set whatever rent you would like. This is called “vacancy decontrol.” But there are restrictions. You can only do this if the tenancy ended for certain reasons, and you have to be willing to swear to them:

1. If the tenant left “voluntarily.”

In other words, this condition is met if you served a notice to quit (eviction notice) for a just cause, and the tenant left before you got to court, before the case was decided, or you mediated.

You have to be able to swear that the eviction process started for a just cause.

2. The tenancy ended because of a court judgment or other court agreement.

This condition is met if you won your just cause eviction case.

1. If one of those two things is true, then you have to give your new renter a statement that swears the prior tenant left for one of those two reasons (voluntarily or because you won your just cause eviction in court). The statement has to inform your new renter that you can set whatever starting rent you’d like. Increases after have to follow the rent control limits.

1. If your prior tenancy ended for some other reason that was not just cause, then your base rent must be the prior rent, plus whatever increase you are allowed under rent control.

Section 6: More compromises from both sides. We get renovation exemptions. But we also get rent control boards.

Rent control boards made everything worse the last time we had rent control. Rent increases, eviction and renovations took so long that things literally fell apart.

We believe Cambridge and Brookline never officially repealed their rent control boards, meaning as soon as this compromise is passed, the boards come back immediately without either town voting for it.

1. Cities and towns “may” implement rent control boards. The EOHLC will have to work with the attorney general to come up with rules that these boards must follow.

It doesn’t say who is paying for the bureaucracy (hint: it’s you, the local taxpayer).

Note: Rent control boards are not limited to the powers specified here. This compromise text lacks any language restricting the rent board’s actions. Under rent control in the 1980s and early ’90s, rent boards stopped all court filings until they gave approval, made it a misdemeanor to fail to file certain paperwork, and delayed normal rental operations. All of this is permitted again with this compromise.

1. Additional regulations will be drafted over and above this law. The regulations must define a process and guidelines for exemptions from the rent cap.

Under previous versions of rent control, this involved documenting “fair net operating income.” The process was onerous and required exhaustive public reporting of all incomes and expenditures for a year or more.

EOHLC will draft the regulations with input from the attorney general.

Note: The process excludes ordinary tax increases and maintenance. The key wording here is “extraordinary.” Presumably, the EOHLC/AG will decide, without input from real housing providers, how much renovation is required before it is considered “extraordinary.”

The process they come up with has to address the following issues:

1. Property owners will have to apply for an exemption to the rent cap. You will have to have documentation.

Note: The wording specifically does not use verbiage required by the small business impact statement law; any amount of documentation that the EOHLC, in their sole discretion, considers reasonable will be required. Be prepared to jump through hoops to get approval.

2. There must be a clear set of standards for reviewing applications. Presumably this means rules that apply to all landlords the same way. In rent control’s past, larger corporate operations routinely received preferential treatment to independent operators on account of their always being represented by counsel.
3. This review must be performed by a neutral party before there can be an approval or denial. Is a member of a rent control board truly “neutral”? We don’t think so. In rent control’s past, rent boards were full of housing justice advocates and non-landlords.

We credit the law with insisting that applications be approved or rejected in a “timely” manner.

Note: The courts are also bound to resolve eviction cases as a “summary process” (timely), and yet still this is very slow. We’re guessing the EHOLC/AG will not give an actual timeframe when they make these regulations for the rent boards.

In practice, regulatory bodies like rent control boards are constantly bogged down and running behind schedule because the workload is greater than the staff to manage it.

Smaller staff = longer wait times.

Larger staff = higher municipal costs.

1. There are no clear prohibitions on EOHLC regulations. Regulatory overreach is a constant problem. To cite a recent example, the EOHLC limited all Section 8 rent increases to a flat 3% regardless of inflation. This is unlawful. It would take a group like MassLandlords to sue to contain the regulations to just what we see in the compromise.

1. Your city or town can make you register your rentals with them. Some municipalities already have rental registries. Towns can also set up rules for notifying tenants about their rights under rent control.

Note: Rental registries have been blocked as unconstitutional in Pennsylvania and are being challenged in federal court. This provision needlessly exposes the commonwealth to litigation risk and does not pertain to rent increases.

Section 7: What happens if the state wants to change some part of this law in the future

1. If the state changes the law in a major way at some point, cities or towns with rent control are grandfathered into the existing law unless they decide to change it.

   If a city or town does decide to change it, it requires a supermajority vote (two-thirds) to change the law on the local level.

In practice, this creates a “ratchet” effect where a strict rent control system cannot easily be corrected or repealed by the state.

1. When a city or town first enacts rent control, a simple majority is required to do so.

Section 8: Cities or towns with rent control will have to submit reports to the state. Here’s what that will include:

• the text of the local law that adopts rent control
• any studies the city or town did that helped with drafting the law
• how many units will be affected by rent control in that city or town, and
• anything else EOHLC wants that they consider important to know.

Section 9: What happens if there’s rent control and non-exempt landlords don’t abide by it

1. Violating the chapter will run you afoul of the state’s consumer protection laws. You could be subject to Attorney General enforcement or your renter could sue or countersue in an eviction.

1. Your penalty if you are found guilty of violating the law will be actual damages, or triple the rent, whichever is more, plus attorneys’ fees. This is in addition to whatever you had to pay your attorney, any lost rent, etc.

Note: The penalty is not triple the unlawful rent increase, but triple the rent for however long the violation was in effect. This will be ruinous.

1. If you try to remove your renter through a non-just cause eviction, you will have to evict the successor tenant and move back in the previous tenant. Note the language specifically says the renter will recover possession. During an eviction, the renter remains in possession. This wording disastrously allows the tenant to recover possession once dispossessed by a court.

In addition, you’ll pay your tenant actual damages, or triple the rent for the duration of the violation, whichever is more, plus attorneys’ fees.

Section 10: Tenant rights

Nothing in the law will erode any other rights tenants currently have, including retaliation, right to form a union, etc.

Despite this wording, this compromise represents a fatal erosion of housing provider rights, including our constitutional rights under 40P to receive compensation for private property appropriated to public purpose or for rent control.