Parking Agreements and Leases: Know Your Rights

Parking is either written into your lease or covered by a separate parking agreement, and that difference helps determine what your landlord can change. A parking fee or assigned space in a fixed-term lease generally cannot be changed until the lease ends unless the lease allows it or you agree, while a separate agreement follows its own notice and cancellation terms subject to state and local law. State law, not just your lease, sets when a car can be towed from an apartment lot; California, Texas, and Florida require posted signs or a notice first. If you have a disability, you can ask for an assigned accessible space near your entrance as a reasonable accommodation (an exception to the landlord's usual rules), and the landlord cannot charge you an extra fee for it.

Is parking part of your lease or a separate agreement?

Look for a parking clause in the lease (a space number, a monthly fee, and rules), a parking addendum signed with the lease, or a separate parking agreement. Which one you have helps determine the rules for a price change or the loss of your space. Two states set specific rules:

• Texas: if a multiunit complex has towing or parking rules, the landlord must give you a copy before you sign the lease. The copy must be signed by you, included in the lease, or attached to it with the lease referring to the attachment, and a lease paragraph containing the rules must be titled "Parking" or "Parking Rules" in capitals, underlining, or bold. To let you park in a space or common lot, the landlord can ask only for your vehicle's make, model, color, year, license number, and state of registration.
• California: in properties with 16 or more residential units that received a certificate of occupancy (the approval to move in to a new building) on or after January 1, 2025, in Alameda, Fresno, Los Angeles, Riverside, Sacramento, San Bernardino, San Joaquin, Santa Clara, Shasta, or Ventura County, parking must be priced separately from rent and placed in an addendum or a separate agreement (Civil Code section 1947.1). Tenants get the first right to the property's spaces. Not paying a separately leased parking fee cannot be the basis for an eviction, but after 45 days unpaid the owner can take back the space. The rule does not cover units with their own attached garage, certain affordable housing, or units rented to tenants with Section 8 vouchers.

Can your landlord raise the parking fee or take your space mid-lease?

It depends on where the parking terms are and what kind of tenancy you have:

California Civil Code section 827 measures the percentage against the lowest rent charged in the 12 months before the increase takes effect. Add five days for a rent-increase notice mailed within California; mailing from elsewhere requires more time.

In Texas, a landlord cannot terminate or suspend an issued tenant parking permit before your right to possession of the rental ends. In Berkeley units fully covered by the Rent Ordinance, parking included in the base or initial rent must continue as a housing service. Only parking outside those regulated services may be rented separately, under a written agreement with commercially reasonable terms that is not a condition of tenancy. Ending or breaching that agreement cannot be grounds for eviction, and either party must give 30 days' written notice to terminate it.

In a Texas multiunit complex, a landlord changing towing or parking rules during your lease must give you written notice and carries the burden of proving you received it. Changes cannot take effect until at least 14 days after notice is delivered, except for construction or utility emergencies. Unless you consent in writing, the change must apply to all of that landlord's tenants in the complex and be based on necessity, tenant safety or security, reasonable construction needs, or other tenants' parking rights.

If you agree to a change, such as a new space or fee, put it in a signed amendment; see our guide to lease addendums and amendments. If the landlord takes away parking your lease includes without your agreement, that can be a breach of the lease, and our guide to what to do when your landlord breaks the lease covers your options. For the rest of a lease's terms, see understanding your lease terms.

When an apartment lot can tow your car

Each state sets its own rules for towing from private lots. Three large rental states:

In California, if you request your car before it is removed from the property, the tow company must release it immediately and unconditionally, without requiring payment first. It may charge up to half its regular towing charge only if your car has already been hooked up to the truck or lifted. In Florida, if you request your car while it is being towed from the lot, the operator must stop and return it upon payment of a reasonable service fee capped at half the posted towing rate.

Texas adds rules for apartment complexes. A complex cannot tow a car only because its registration or license plate has expired, unless the lease allows it and you get at least 10 days' written notice first. A complex can tow without posted signs a car that blocks a gate, a trash area, or a marked fire lane, sits in a marked tow-away zone, or is parked in a disability space without a disability plate or placard, as long as it tells you on request which towing company and storage lot it uses.

If your car is towed, photograph the signs at the lot entrance, keep every receipt, and note the date, because the deadline to challenge the tow can be short.

How to request an accessible parking space

Most landlords must make reasonable exceptions to their rules when a tenant with a disability needs one, and HUD's fair housing regulation uses parking to show how: at a 300-unit complex with first-come, first-served parking, refusing a reserved space near his unit to a tenant who cannot walk more than a short distance violates the law. According to the 2008 HUD and Justice Department joint statement on reasonable modifications:

• Courts have treated a request for a parking space as a request for a reasonable accommodation and have put the responsibility for providing it on the landlord, even when the space costs the landlord something.
• Courts have required an assigned space even where the landlord had a policy of not assigning spaces or had a waiting list.
• The landlord may not charge you an extra fee as a condition of getting an accessible space.
• Providing one can mean new signs, repainted markings, reassigned spaces, or a curb cut.

To ask, tell the landlord what you need and how it relates to your disability. A request can be made orally or in writing, but writing helps both sides, and a landlord must consider a request even if you do not use its form. The landlord may ask for reliable information to verify your disability only if it is not obvious or already known, and to establish your disability-related need for the space only if that need is not apparent or known. It generally cannot ask about the nature or severity of your disability. If the landlord thinks the request is unreasonable, the 2004 joint statement on reasonable accommodations says it should discuss alternatives with you. Our guide to disability accommodations in rental housing explains what to do if the landlord refuses.