For twenty-five years, Minnesota’s law on utility bills in an apartment building with one meter was § 504B.215. It’s the statute that made the landlord the utility’s customer and let him split the bill among the tenants by whatever “equitable method of apportionment” he wrote into the lease.
It’s gone. The Legislature repealed it in 2024, effective January 1, 2025. 2024 Minn. Laws ch. 107, §§ 9, 10. Pull it up on the Revisor’s site and you get a one-line entry: “[Repealed, 2024 c 107 s 9]”.
What replaced it is a lot more specific and a lot less friendly to landlords. There’s a new § 504B.216 in the landlord-tenant chapter, and over in the public utilities chapter a rewritten § 216B.022 and two new sections, §§ 216B.023 and 216B.024. Electricity can’t be split among tenants anymore at all. Utility add-on fees are capped at $8 and $5. A tenant with a gas or electric billing dispute can take it to the Public Utilities Commission. And the House Research Department’s summary of the act says it plainly: “This act changes and replaces the law on shared-meter utility billing for residential rental units.”
How the Legislature got there is the more interesting story. Twice, a Minnesota tenant took a utility billing problem to the Court of Appeals. Twice, the court said the statute didn’t say what the tenant needed it to say. And twice, the Legislature went back and wrote it in.
The court kept telling tenants the statute didn’t say it
Round one, 2009. A tenant leased a unit in a 21-unit Minneapolis building in November 2007. The leasing agent gave her a utilities figure of $60 to $80 a month, which the trial court found was a year-round average. That winter her share of the building’s gas and water ran $168.18 in December, $171.39 in January, and $170.67 in February. Kutscheid v. Emerald Square Props., Inc., 770 N.W.2d 529, 530–31 (Minn. Ct. App. 2009). The old statute required that prospective tenants get “notice of the total utility cost for the building for each month of the most recent calendar year”. The court held a per-unit annual average didn’t cut it: “The statute requires disclosure of the total utility cost for the building for each month of the most recent calendar year.” Id. at 532. She won that point.
Then she asked for the remedy in § 504B.221, the unlawful-utility-interruption statute, which pays treble damages or $500, whichever is greater, plus attorney fees. The court said no. The statute tied § 504B.221 to the landlord’s duty to be the customer of record in subdivision 2, and said nothing about the disclosure rules in subdivision 2a, so § 504B.221 didn’t apply to a subdivision 2a violation. Id. at 533.
The next year the Legislature added a sentence to subdivision 2a: “A failure by the landlord to comply with this subdivision is a violation of sections 504B.161, subdivision 1, clause (1), and 504B.221.” 2010 Minn. Laws ch. 315, § 7.
Round two, 2015. Two tenants in buildings in St. Louis Park and Brooklyn Park sued over the fees a third-party billing company charged on top of their apportioned water, sewer, and trash bills: a new-account activation fee, a monthly administrative fee, a late-payment fee, and a convenience fee for paying by card. Persigehl v. Ridgebrook Invs. Ltd. P’ship, 858 N.W.2d 824, 828–29 (Minn. Ct. App. 2015). The court read § 504B.215 and found nothing about fees. “Nevertheless, nothing in the plain language of the statute prohibits a landlord from charging additional fees.” Id. at 832. And it said who could fix that:
Had the legislature intended to regulate fees associated with the apportionment of utility charges separately from rent, it easily could have added to subdivision 2a similar restrictions governing the use of such fees.
— Persigehl, 858 N.W.2d at 834–35
Setting the right level of fees, the court said, was “a deliberation best left for the legislature’s attention.” Id. at 835. One judge dissented in part. Id. at 836 (Peterson, J., dissenting in part).
Nine years later, the Legislature did exactly what the court said it easily could have. A landlord who bills separately for utilities “may charge a tenant a single administrative billing charge per billing period for all the utilities that are separately billed”, and it “must not exceed $8.” Minn. Stat. § 504B.216, subd. 8. One late charge per billing period, “must not exceed $5 per month”, and “[l]ate fees must not be compounded.” Id., subd. 9. Beyond those two, “no other fees or charges may be imposed on or collected from tenants for utility service”. Id., subd. 8. No activation fee. No convenience fee. No utility-management line item.
The court wasn’t wrong either time. It read the statute the Legislature wrote. The Legislature just kept finishing its sentences after the fact.
Your landlord can’t split the electric bill anymore
This is the biggest change, and it’s two sentences long. In § 504B.216: “Apportionment of electricity is prohibited.” Subd. 5(a). And in the utilities chapter, a landlord who bills a tenant separately from rent for electricity “must not apportion the service”. § 216B.023, subd. 2(a).
So a landlord who wants to bill you separately for electricity has to measure what your unit actually uses, with a submeter. Otherwise it goes in the rent. The submeter rules, which mostly sit in chapter 216B, are tight:
- You pay only for the electricity used in your unit, figured by multiplying the kilowatt-hours on your submeter “by the rate charged to the landlord by the utility provider.” § 216B.023, subd. 2(b)(1). No markup. And the landlord “must not charge a tenant for electricity consumed in common areas or in spaces used exclusively or primarily by the landlord”. Id.
- The fixed charges, taxes, and surcharges on the building’s bill get divided “equally among the number of units in the building”. Id., subd. 2(b)(2). So do any bill credits the landlord gets. Id., subd. 2(b)(3).
- Every submetered bill has to show the present and previous readings, the rate you’re billed and the rate the landlord is billed, your share of taxes and surcharges, any administrative charge, and the due date and late-charge terms. Id., subd. 1(c). And it has to be “based on actual submeter readings.” Id., subd. 1(a).
- Submeters installed on or after January 1, 2025 must meet American National Standards Institute standards, and every submeter, whenever it went in, “must accurately measure utility service.” § 216B.022, subd. 2(b)–(c).
- The landlord can’t pass along the capital cost of the submeters, or the cost of installing, maintaining, repairing, replacing, or reading them, unless your own willful, malicious, or negligent conduct caused the expense. Id., subd. 5.
Think your submeter is running fast? Tell the landlord in writing and say why. The landlord then “must promptly investigate”. § 216B.022, subd. 4(a). If it was overcharging you, the landlord “must promptly refund the difference”. Id., subd. 4(b). If it was undercharging you, the landlord can back-bill no more than the previous six months, on a payment plan with no interest or delinquency fee if you did nothing to cause it. Id., subd. 4(c); § 216B.023, subd. 8. And if the landlord sits on your complaint and doesn’t test the meter within a reasonable time, it can’t recover any undercharge for the stretch between your notice and the test. § 216B.022, subd. 4(d). Plain billing errors work the same way: refund overcharges promptly, back-bill undercharges for six months at most. § 216B.023, subd. 5.
Gas and water can still be apportioned, but only by formula, and the formula is in the statute now, not in the lease. Gas goes by square footage, water and sewer by the number of people on the lease, and nobody pays for common areas, the landlord’s office, or vacant units. Water also can’t include laundry rooms or pools. § 504B.216, subds. 6–7. I walked through those formulas, and how a utility charge interacts with the Total Monthly Payment rule, at /news/minnesota-apartment-fees-total-monthly-payment-504b120/.
That takes care of ratio utility billing, or RUBS: any formula that divides the building’s bill by some yardstick the landlord picked. The old statute required only “an equitable method of apportionment”, and a lot of formulas could pass for equitable. The new one says a landlord “may apportion and bill for natural gas usage and nonusage charges only as provided in this subdivision”, and says the same about water. § 504B.216, subds. 6(a), 7(a). A formula that isn’t the statute’s formula isn’t allowed.
If gas or water is apportioned, the lease has to carry an attachment headed “UTILITY BILLS” in the statute’s own words, explaining how the bill is calculated, the $5 and $8 caps, your right to a payment plan, and your right to see the building’s bill. § 504B.216, subd. 10. You can ask for the current bill being split, and for the past bills going back two years or to when the current landlord bought the building, whichever is more recent. Id., subd. 5(c).
The hallway-lights problem
Here’s a wrinkle I didn’t expect.
The old statute defined a “single-metered residential building” as one where a single meter “provides service to an individual unit and to all or parts of common areas or other units.” Minn. Stat. § 504B.215, subd. 1 (2022). That’s the classic setup: your apartment’s meter also runs the hallway lights or the boiler room, so you’re paying for the landlord’s electricity. The old law made the landlord the customer of record for exactly that building, unless the common-area load was small enough to fall under a tariff’s de minimis exception.
The new definition counts meters. A “shared-metered residential building” is one “where the building’s utility service is measured by fewer meters than the number of separate dwelling units in the building.” § 504B.216, subd. 1(e); § 216B.022, subd. 1(e). Picture a fourplex with four meters, one per unit, and the hallway wired into Unit 1’s. Four meters, four units. As I read the new definition, that isn’t a shared-metered residential building at all, and the new section doesn’t reach it.
I read chapters 504B and 216B looking for anything that picks up a common area wired into one tenant’s meter and didn’t find it. If that’s your building, you’re back to your lease, your utility’s tariff, and the general law, and an argument that you shouldn’t be paying to light the landlord’s hallway. That’s a fair argument. It’s just not a statute anymore.
The landlord can’t shut you off, and can’t evict you fast either
A landlord who bills you for a utility is not the utility, and the statute says so: “Disconnection of a tenant’s utility service by a landlord for the failure to pay utility service charges is prohibited.” § 504B.216, subd. 12(a). “Disconnection” includes a load limiter or “any device that limits or interrupts utility service in any way”. Id., subd. 12(g)(2).
More from the same subdivision:
- If the landlord says you owe both rent and utilities, what you pay goes to rent first. Id., subd. 12(b).
- The landlord has to offer you a payment plan, and can’t bring a breach-of-lease claim over unpaid utilities until you’ve missed two consecutive payments on it. Id., subd. 12(d)(1); § 216B.023, subd. 7.
- No eviction filing over gas or electric charges during the cold weather period, none over electric charges during a heat emergency, and none while a household member is in a medical emergency or depends on life-sustaining electrical equipment, once a licensed medical health care professional certifies the emergency within five days. Any eviction already filed gets stayed. § 504B.216, subd. 12(d)(2).
The cold weather period runs “from October 1 through April 30 of the following year”. § 216B.096, subd. 2(b). The rest of the Cold Weather Rule is at /news/minnesota-cold-weather-rule-utility-shutoff-216b-096/. That piece also covers what happens when it’s the landlord who stops paying the utility, and you’re the one who gets the shutoff notice.
And if the landlord files an eviction for unpaid utility charges anyway, the court’s hands are tied in your favor. If you’ve filed a complaint with the PUC about gas or electric service, the court “must stay the action until the commission has made a final determination” and can’t make you pay money into court first. § 504B.285, subd. 4(b)(1). If you qualify for a fee waiver, the court can’t make you post security for utility charges. Id., subd. 4(b)(2). And a court “must not require a tenant to post rent as a condition of a tenant asserting an affirmative claim or defense, or a counterclaim related to landlord utility billings or practices.” Id., subd. 4(c).
What can you do about a bad utility bill?
Start with the landlord, because for gas and electric you have to. A tenant disputing a bill “must first attempt to resolve the dispute or claim with the landlord.” § 216B.024. If you don’t like the landlord’s answer, the landlord has to tell you about your right to complain to the commission’s consumer affairs office. Id. After that, you’ve got options, and they aren’t exclusive:
| Route | What it covers | What it gets you |
|---|---|---|
| PUC complaint | Gas and electric billing under §§ 216B.022–216B.024 | The commission can resolve the complaint and levy “a penalty of not less than $100 and not more than $1,000 for each violation”; you keep your right to sue. § 216B.098, subd. 6 |
| Rent escrow | Any violation of chapter 504B, including § 504B.216 | Written notice to the landlord, 14 days to fix it, then rent goes to the court instead of the landlord. § 504B.385, subd. 1(c) |
| Lawsuit under § 504B.221 | Violations of § 504B.216, subds. 2–7, 10, and 12 | Treble damages or $500, whichever is greater, plus reasonable attorney fees. § 504B.221(a); § 504B.216, subd. 16 |
| Attorney General | Any violation of § 504B.216 | Investigation and enforcement under § 8.31. § 504B.216, subd. 17 |
A few notes on that table, because the details matter.
The PUC route is for gas and electric only. Chapter 216B defines “utility service” for these sections as “natural gas and electricity.” § 216B.022, subd. 1(j). Water and sewer disputes stay in the landlord-tenant world.
The § 504B.221 route is where the Kutscheid history pays off. Subdivision 16 makes a violation of subdivisions 2 through 12 a violation of the landlord’s covenants in § 504B.161, and a violation of subdivisions 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, and 12 a violation of § 504B.221. Notice what’s missing from the second list: subdivisions 8 and 9, the $8 and $5 caps. An inflated admin fee is a covenant violation you can escrow rent over. On the statute’s words, it isn’t a § 504B.221 violation. Also, § 504B.221 was written for a landlord who cuts off your electricity, heat, gas, or water. It limits recovery to actual damages in some situations, like where the tenant never gave the landlord notice of the interruption, or the landlord restored service within a reasonable time after notice. How a court fits those limits to a billing violation is a question I couldn’t find an appellate court answering.
Rent escrow and the habitability covenants are covered at /news/minnesota-tenant-habitability-rent-escrow/. If the overcharge is the whole fight and it’s a few hundred dollars, conciliation court is built for that, and I explained it at /news/minnesota-conciliation-court-491a/. And if you’re worried the landlord will retaliate for complaining, Minnesota’s retaliation defense protects a tenant’s “good faith attempt to secure or enforce rights under a lease or contract, oral or written, under the laws of the state”. § 504B.285, subd. 2(1). That’s at /news/minnesota-landlord-retaliation-504b-285/.
None of these rights can be signed away. The tenant rights in § 504B.216 “may not be waived or modified”. Subd. 14(2).
I couldn’t find a published Minnesota appellate decision applying § 504B.216 or §§ 216B.022 through 216B.024 yet. I searched CourtListener for the section numbers, for “shared-metered”, and for apportionment terms. CourtListener has real gaps for Minnesota and indexes no district court files, so that tells you what’s been published, and not much more.
The fine print on dates
Two effective dates, and they’re not the same.
The chapter 216B sections, the PUC’s authority, the eviction protections in § 504B.285, and the repeal of § 504B.215 all took effect January 1, 2025. The new § 504B.216 took effect January 1, 2025, “for leases entered into or renewed on or after that date.” 2024 Minn. Laws ch. 107, § 10. Any lease signed or renewed since then is covered. But if you’re on a multiyear lease signed in 2024 and never renewed, the electricity ban in chapter 216B reaches you and § 504B.216 may not. That’s a question worth asking before you file anything.
The Legislature has kept tinkering. In 2026 it added rules for a tenant’s final bill on move-out: if the landlord doesn’t have the utility’s actual bill yet, it can send an estimate based on the last billing period, prorated to your move-out date, with no added fees beyond the $8 and $5 charges. § 504B.216, subd. 7a; § 216B.023, subd. 3a; 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 81, §§ 1, 4. Those sections carry no effective-date clause, so they took effect August 1, 2026. § 645.02.
And then there’s subdivision 11, which may be the only statute I’ve read that hands homework to a trade group. It says that by July 1, 2025, “an organization representing landlords shall work with organizations representing tenants and other relevant groups and agencies” to figure out how a tenant, on apportioned bills under leases entered into or renewed on or after July 1, 2026, can understand and verify the calculation. § 504B.216, subd. 11. It doesn’t say which organization, and it doesn’t say what happens if nobody does it.
For years the statute let landlords write their own utility math, as long as they called it equitable. Now the math is in the statute, and the landlord’s only job is to follow it.
Madgett Law, LLC
Madgett Law, LLC handles real estate disputes between landlords and tenants, along with consumer claims over unfair business practices. If you’ve got a utility bill that doesn’t add up, a fee you think the statute doesn’t allow, or an eviction filed over utility charges, read about our general litigation practice, then send us a message.
Sources: 2024 Minn. Laws ch. 107, §§ 1–3 (amending § 216B.022; enacting §§ 216B.023–216B.024), § 4 (amending § 216B.098, subd. 6), § 7 (enacting § 504B.216), § 8 (amending § 504B.285, subd. 4), § 9 (repealing § 504B.215), § 10 (effective dates: January 1, 2025; § 504B.216 for leases entered into or renewed on or after that date); Minn. Stat. § 504B.215, subds. 1, 2, 2a (2022) (repealed; enacted 1999 c 199 art 1 s 24); 2010 Minn. Laws ch. 315, § 7 (adding § 504B.215, subd. 2a(c)); Minn. Stat. § 504B.216, subd. 1(e) (shared-metered residential building), subd. 5(a) (apportionment of electricity prohibited), subd. 5(c) (copies of current and past bills), subds. 6–7 (natural gas and water apportionment), subd. 7a (final billing), subd. 8 ($8 administrative billing charge; no other fees), subd. 9 ($5 late payment charge; no compounding), subd. 10 (lease attachment), subd. 11 (verification), subd. 12(a)–(b), (d), (g) (no disconnection by landlord; payments to rent first; payment plan; eviction limits; disconnection defined), subd. 14(2) (no waiver), subd. 16 (violations of §§ 504B.161 and 504B.221), subd. 17 (Attorney General); Minn. Stat. § 216B.022, subd. 1(e), (j) (definitions), subd. 2(b)–(c) (submeter standards and accuracy), subd. 4(a)–(d) (inaccurate submeters), subd. 5 (submeter costs); Minn. Stat. § 216B.023, subd. 1(a), (c) (submetered bills), subd. 2(a)–(b) (electricity), subd. 3a (final billing), subd. 5 (billing errors), subd. 7 (payment plans), subd. 8 (undercharges); Minn. Stat. § 216B.024 (dispute resolution); Minn. Stat. § 216B.098, subd. 6(a)–(b) (commission authority; $100 to $1,000 penalty); Minn. Stat. § 504B.221(a) (treble damages or $500; attorney fees; actual damages only in listed situations); Minn. Stat. § 504B.285, subd. 2(1) (retaliation defense), subd. 4(b)–(c) (eviction for utility charges); Minn. Stat. § 504B.385, subd. 1(c) (rent escrow after written notice and 14 days); Minn. Stat. § 216B.096, subd. 2(b) (cold weather period); Minn. Stat. § 504B.001, subd. 14(2) (violation includes a violation of chapter 504B); 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 81, §§ 1, 4 (final billing); Minn. Stat. § 645.02 (default effective date); Kutscheid v. Emerald Square Props., Inc., 770 N.W.2d 529, 530–33 (Minn. Ct. App. 2009); Persigehl v. Ridgebrook Invs. Ltd. P’ship, 858 N.W.2d 824, 828–29, 832, 834–36 (Minn. Ct. App. 2015); Minnesota House Research Department, Act Summary, 2024 Minn. Laws ch. 107 (H.F. 4558) (May 23, 2024). This article is general information about Minnesota law, not legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney–client relationship, and no outcome is promised or implied.