Miami-Dade's Tenant's Bill of Rights Ordinance: No Longer Enforceable

What Happened to the Tenant's Bill of Rights Ordinance

Adopted May 3, 2022, Miami-Dade's Tenant's Bill of Rights Ordinance required landlords to give every tenant a written Notice of Tenant Rights within 10 days of the start or renewal of a tenancy, created a county Housing Advocacy office and tenant helpline, and extended notice periods beyond what state law required at the time. That changed the following year: HB 1417 created Florida Statute 83.425, which states that "the regulation of residential tenancies, the landlord-tenant relationship, and all other matters covered under this part are preempted to the state." That means local ordinances like Miami-Dade's — along with similar ones in Broward, Pinellas, Orange, and Hillsborough counties — are superseded wherever they conflict with or extend beyond Florida's statewide Landlord and Tenant Act.

What This Means for Miami-Dade Landlords Now

Practically, this changes several things landlords may have been complying with under the old ordinance:

• No more mandatory Notice of Tenant Rights. Landlords are no longer required to provide the county's specific written notice within 10 days of a tenancy starting.
• Notice periods follow state law, not the old county extensions. For a month-to-month tenancy, Florida Statute 83.57 now sets a 30-day notice period for either party to terminate — use the statewide standard rather than any county-specific timeline you may have followed previously.
• Rent increase and fee notice requirements follow Chapter 83, not any local extension the county ordinance previously layered on top.
• Security deposit handling follows Florida Statute 83.49 — deposits must be returned within 15 days if no claim is made, or the landlord must send written notice of intent to claim within 30 days, giving the tenant 15 days to object.

If you built lease templates or internal policies around the old ordinance's specific notice periods or the Notice of Tenant Rights requirement, it's worth reviewing them against current Florida Statute Chapter 83 rather than continuing to rely on county-specific guidance.

What's Still Uncertain: Discrimination Protections

One open question hasn't been fully resolved by courts or the legislature: whether local discrimination protections that go beyond what Chapter 83 covers — like Miami-Dade's ban on source-of-income discrimination (refusing an applicant for using a housing voucher) — survived the preemption. Florida has no statewide source-of-income protection, and the Landlord and Tenant Act itself doesn't address fair housing directly, which has left the question open to interpretation. Until this is settled by the courts or the legislature, the more conservative approach is to continue following existing local fair housing rules where they exist, rather than assuming they no longer apply.

What Landlords Should Do Now

Rather than relying on Miami-Dade's old Notice of Tenant Rights or any ordinance-specific guidance, landlords should:

• Base lease terms, notice periods, and deposit handling on Florida Statute Chapter 83, Part II directly.
• Review any lease templates or tenant communications that were built around the old county ordinance.
• Continue following existing local fair housing protections where they exist, given the unresolved status of that piece specifically.
• Consult a real estate attorney if you're unsure whether a specific local rule you've been following still applies.