Some of the information Arizona requires you to give a tenant does not have to be part of the lease. What the law asks is that it is in writing, and that your tenant has it at or before the tenancy begins.
The lease is a perfectly good place for most of it, and Arizona lease forms usually carry an owner and manager block for exactly that reason. What a lease cannot do is finish the job on its own. Several of these duties continue after signing day: keeping the information current, handing it over again on request, and passing on a foreclosure notice that may arrive years later.
Three disclosures apply to every rental. Three more depend on the property or the circumstances, and for a lot of readers none of those three will apply at all.
This page is written for the landlord. If you are the tenant, the guide for tenants covers the same ground from your side.
Disclosures for Every Arizona Rental
Who Manages the Property
The name and address of the person authorized to manage the property. If you manage it yourself, that person is you, and it still has to be written down.
Who Owns It, and Where Legal Papers Go
The name and address of an owner, or of somebody authorized to act for the owner, for service of process and for receiving notices and demands.
That is the address where legal papers reach you, and it is worth keeping accurate for your own sake. A number of your tenant’s rights under the Act begin with sending you a written notice, and a notice that goes to the wrong place still creates the argument about whether it arrived.
Where to Read the Act
You have to tell your tenant, in writing, that the Arizona Residential Landlord and Tenant Act is available on the Arizona Department of Housing’s website. It is one line, and plenty of lease forms do not carry it, so it is worth checking yours.
Keep It Current, and Give It Again on Request
The information has to be kept up to date, and handed over again whenever your tenant asks for it.
It also follows the property rather than the person. The requirement is enforceable against any successor landlord, owner or manager, so a sale does not clear it.
What Happens if You Do Not Disclose
Arizona attaches an unusual consequence to missing any of the three disclosures above, or to failing to keep them current.
A person who fails to comply becomes an agent of each person who is a landlord, for two purposes. The first is service of process and receiving notices and demands. The second is performing the landlord’s obligations under the Act and under the lease, including spending the rent collected from the property in order to do it.
Responsibility moves, rather than money. That is worth knowing if you manage a tenancy for somebody else. The person who failed to disclose is the person those obligations can land on, so check that the ownership and management details were actually given.
Disclosures That Depend on the Property
The remaining three are conditional. Read the condition before the rule in each case, because it may decide that the rule is not yours.
Bedbug Materials, and the Exception That Covers Most Readers
If you are leasing a single family residence, this Arizona bedbug section does not apply to you or to your tenant. For a great many readers of this site that is the end of the subject.
For everything else, two duties. You have to provide bedbug educational materials to existing and new tenants. And you may not enter into a lease for a unit you know currently has an infestation.
The statute is generous about what counts as educational material. It may describe how to prevent and control bedbugs, and what they look like. It may cover the behaviors that carry risk. Material from the CDC counts, as does material from federal, state or local health or housing agencies, or from nonprofit housing organizations. So does material you write yourself.
Tenants carry duties here too. They must not knowingly move infested materials in, and a tenant who knows bedbugs are present has to tell you in writing or electronically.
One honest note on consequences. Unlike the disclosures above, this section attaches no penalty of its own. It says instead that it does not limit any other rights, remedies and obligations under the Act. A failure here falls into the Act’s general noncompliance machinery rather than carrying a stated result of its own.
If the Property Is in Foreclosure
Three things decide what you owe here, and a table is the quickest way through them.
| Situation | What you have to do |
|---|---|
| A foreclosure action had already started when the lease was signed | Include the written foreclosure notice with the agreement |
| A trustee’s sale or other foreclosure notice arrives after your tenant has signed | Give your tenant that notice within five business days. The first such notice only |
| The building has four or more connected units | None of this section applies |
Where the notice is required with the agreement, the statute prescribes substantially the form it takes. It has to say that the property is undergoing foreclosure, and who to contact for more information. It has to say that a sale at auction may or may not follow. And it has to give either the time, date and place set for a sale, or a statement that no date has been set.
There is a consequence attached to this one. A tenant who should have received the notice and did not may serve written notice under the Act’s noncompliance provision, recover damages and seek an injunction. The security deposit is also returned to the tenant, under the ordinary deposit rules.
Lead-Based Paint, Which Is Federal
This is the one duty on the page that has nothing to do with the Arizona Legislature, and it applies whatever the state requires.
For older housing, federal law asks for three things before your tenant is obligated under the lease. Give them the EPA’s lead hazard information pamphlet. Disclose any known lead-based paint or lead-based paint hazards in the property. And hand over any lead hazard evaluation report you have.
Two practical points. The federal rule applies to target housing. That is a defined term with its own exceptions, not a plain synonym for “built before 1978”, so check the definition against your property. And the paperwork is the compliance record: the signed disclosure and acknowledgment is what shows the duty was met, which makes it worth keeping with the lease rather than loose.
The Short Version
Before your tenant is obligated under the lease, in writing:
- the name and address of whoever manages the property;
- the name and address of an owner, and where legal papers should go;
- one line saying where to read the Act;
- bedbug educational materials, if the Arizona bedbug section applies to the property;
- the foreclosure notice, if a foreclosure action had started before signing and the building is not four or more connected units;
- the federal lead-based paint disclosure and pamphlet, if the property is target housing.
Then keep all of it current, hand it over again if your tenant asks, and pass on a foreclosure notice within five business days if one arrives later in the tenancy.
What has to be inside the agreement itself is covered on what a lease should include, and the move-in paperwork that travels with the deposit is on security deposits.
Where These Rules Come From
Arizona’s laws are collected in a set called the Arizona Revised Statutes, usually shortened to A.R.S. The number that follows points to one section of it.
You do not need these numbers to use this page. They are here so that you, or a lawyer you hire, can check the exact wording. Each one links to the official text on the Arizona Legislature’s website, which opens in a new tab.
- A.R.S. 33-1322 is the disclosure section. Subsection A carries the manager and owner details. B is the written notice about the Department of Housing website. C is the duty to keep the information current and hand it over again on request, and the rule binding a successor. Subsection D is the consequence, and it covers failures of A, B and C alike.
- A.R.S. 33-1319 is bedbug control. Subsection A is the landlord’s duties and the list of what may count as educational material. B is the tenant’s duties. C says the section does not limit other rights and remedies, and D is the single family residence exclusion.
- A.R.S. 33-1331 is foreclosure. Subsection A is the notice that goes with a lease signed after a foreclosure action began. B is the five business days for a notice arriving later. C is the tenant’s remedies where notice was not given, and D the exclusion for buildings of four or more connected units.
- 42 U.S.C. 4852d is federal rather than Arizona law. It is the lead-based paint disclosure requirement, and it is the source of the pamphlet, the disclosure of known paint or hazards, and the evaluation report.
Common Questions
What must an Arizona landlord disclose in writing?
Who manages the property, who owns it and where legal papers should be sent, and a written note that the Act is available on the Arizona Department of Housing's website.
Do these disclosures have to be a separate document?
No. The law asks for them in writing, at or before the tenancy begins. Putting them in the lease is fine, and most Arizona lease forms do.
Do bedbug rules apply to a single house?
No. That section does not apply to the landlord or the tenant of a single family residence.
What happens if a landlord fails to make these disclosures?
The person who failed becomes an agent of each landlord, for receiving legal papers and notices and for performing the landlord's obligations, including spending collected rent to do so.
Do the disclosures still apply if the property is sold?
Yes. The requirement binds any successor landlord, owner or manager, and the information has to be kept current.
Must a landlord tell a tenant the property is in foreclosure?
Usually. If the lease was signed after the action began, notice goes with the agreement. If a foreclosure notice arrives later, you have five business days to pass on the first one. Buildings of four or more connected units are excluded.
What if the foreclosure notice is never given?
The tenant can serve written notice under the Act, recover damages and seek an injunction, and the deposit is returned under the ordinary deposit rules.
Is lead paint disclosure an Arizona requirement?
No, it is federal. It covers target housing, which is a defined term with its own exceptions, and it applies whatever Arizona requires.