On August 1, 2025, Massachusetts became the first state to take renters statewide off the hook for broker fees they never agreed to, weeks after New York City did the same under its FARE Act. The rule sounds simple: whoever hires the broker pays the broker. One year later, the Attorney General’s office says it has found brokers and landlords still charging tenants unlawful fees, and housing attorneys report that the fee has not so much disappeared as changed its name. With the September 1 moving crush underway, here is what the law requires, what the first year looks like, and what a renter can do about an illegal charge.
Summary: What the Law Says
The broker fee provision rode into law inside the state budget. Section 43 of Chapter 9 of the Acts of 2025, the fiscal year 2026 appropriations act, amended G.L. c. 112, § 87DDD½, the statute that licenses apartment rental agents. The amendment took effect August 1, 2025, and its operative sentence is short: any fee for finding a dwelling “shall only be paid by the party, lessor or tenant who originally engaged and entered into a contract with the licensed broker or salesperson.”
In practice, the landlord hires the listing broker. The landlord pays.
Before the change, Greater Boston renters routinely paid a fee equal to one month’s rent to a broker who worked for the landlord, listed the landlord’s unit, and answered to the landlord. Stacked on first month, last month, and a security deposit, move-in costs often reached four months’ rent, which for a Boston apartment averaging around $3,500 meant more than $10,000 in cash before getting keys.
The law contains one real exception. A tenant who independently retains a broker, signs an engagement contract with that broker, and has the broker search on the tenant’s behalf can still be charged by that broker. The trigger is the contract the tenant chose to sign, not paperwork a listing agent slides across the table at an open house. A broker cannot represent both sides of the same rental and collect from each.
The enforcement record so far
The Attorney General’s office issued a consumer advisory when the law took effect, telling renters they should not be paying a broker’s fee unless they specifically hired the broker, and directing complaints to its Consumer Advocacy and Response Division. Mark Martinez, a housing attorney at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, told GBH News that “there’s really no ambiguity anymore” about who owes the fee.
Compliance has lagged behind clarity. By June 2026, GBH reported that the Attorney General’s office had uncovered several instances of brokers and landlords charging tenants unlawful broker’s fees since the law took effect. As of this writing, the office has not announced a public enforcement action naming a specific brokerage or released complaint totals. The Massachusetts Association of Realtors advised members after passage that they cannot collect broker fees from tenants on landlord listings and cannot advertise tenant-paid fees.
So the first-year scorecard reads: clear statute, clear agency guidance, documented violations, and enforcement that has so far run through consumer complaints rather than public cases.
Analysis: The Compliance Gap
The September rental cycle is where the law meets the market. Most Greater Boston leases turn over around September 1, demand outruns supply, and a renter who objects to an improper charge knows ten other applicants are behind them. Shreya Mani, a Boston University graduate student, described the dynamic to GBH after being asked for a $500 application fee: “Even if I say that I won’t be paying this fee, then they’ll just say that your application got rejected.” That leverage, not confusion about the statute, keeps illegal fees alive.
The workarounds reported over the past year fall into three patterns, and each one runs into a specific statute.
Relabeled fees. The most common move is charging the same money under a new name: an “application fee,” an “administrative fee,” a “move-in fee,” an “amenity fee,” a pet deposit. These were already illegal before the broker fee law existed. G.L. c. 186, § 15B(1)(b) permits a landlord to collect exactly four things at or before tenancy: first month’s rent, last month’s rent, a security deposit no larger than one month’s rent, and the actual cost of a new lock and key. Anything mandatory beyond those four violates § 15B regardless of its label. Todd Kaplan of Greater Boston Legal Services put it plainly to GBH: any time a landlord announces a new charge, “it has to be optional.” A relabeled broker fee therefore violates two statutes at once, § 87DDD½ for what it is and § 15B for what it pretends to be. Section 15B binds landlords; a broker collecting a bogus “application fee” for its own account answers instead under its license statute and Chapter 93A.
Manufactured engagement. The second pattern exploits the statute’s exception. A renter inquires about a listed unit, and before a showing the broker produces a “tenant engagement agreement” to sign, then later points to that signature as proof the tenant “hired” the broker and owes the fee. The statute does not support this. The fee may be charged only to the party who “originally engaged” the broker, and a broker who already holds the landlord’s listing was originally engaged by the landlord. Paperwork signed as a condition of seeing an advertised unit is not an independent retention; it is a pretext, and presenting it as a binding fee obligation is the kind of deceptive practice G.L. c. 93A, § 2 prohibits.
Rent absorption. The third pattern is legal. Doug Quattrochi, executive director of MassLandlords, said it out loud before the law even took effect: a landlord “can raise the rent, divide the broker fees by 12, and that’s your new monthly rent amount increase.” Nothing in the statute prevents this. The early data suggests it has been muted so far: Boston Pads figures reported by GBH in June 2026 showed Boston rents up only 1.13 percent year over year, with rising availability. A softer rental market may be doing as much for tenants as the statute.
If you were charged anyway
A renter who paid an unlawful fee has a graduated set of remedies, and the paper trail matters more than anything.
- Document it. Keep the listing, texts and emails, the lease, any “engagement” paperwork, and proof of payment. A fee demanded in writing is the easiest case you will ever prove.
- Demand a refund in writing. Cite G.L. c. 112, § 87DDD½ for a broker fee, or G.L. c. 186, § 15B for an application or other relabeled charge, and set a deadline. Some brokerages refund on request once the statute is quoted back to them.
- File with the Attorney General. The consumer hotline is 617-727-8400, and complaints can be filed online with the Consumer Advocacy and Response Division. Complaints build the record for broader enforcement.
- Send a Chapter 93A demand letter. Charging a fee the statute forbids is an unfair or deceptive practice. A 30-day demand letter is a prerequisite to a consumer 93A suit, and a court can double or treble the damages for a willful or knowing violation and award attorney’s fees. A year of AG advisories makes “we didn’t know” a hard sell on willfulness.
- Sue in small claims if needed. Claims up to $7,000 fit comfortably in small claims court, where you can bring the 93A claim yourself without a lawyer. Certain § 15B violations, such as security deposit abuses, carry their own treble damages; our security deposit guide covers that track.
For what a landlord may lawfully ask during the application stage, including credit and CORI checks, see our guide to tenant background checks in Massachusetts. Screening itself remains legal. Charging you for it does not.
The industry’s position
Landlord and broker groups have not defended illegal charges; their argument is about economics. MassLandlords’ Quattrochi predicted that costs pushed onto small landlords would surface elsewhere, as rent increases or new charges. Rental agents warned the fee shift would thin their ranks: Sophia Bruno, a leasing agent with Prestige Property Solutions, told GBH the change meant rental work was “definitely not going to make it worth driving into Boston every day,” since small landlords would show units themselves. The Massachusetts Association of Realtors has focused its guidance on compliance, telling members not to collect from tenants and not to advertise tenant-paid fees on landlord listings.
What to watch
Three things will decide whether year two looks different. First, whether the Attorney General converts the violations it says it has found into public enforcement, which would put a price on noncompliance beyond the occasional refund. Second, whether private 93A cases start producing treble damage awards; a few small claims judgments circulating through broker offices would change behavior faster than any advisory. Third, the rent data. If the market stays soft, the fee shift sticks as a genuine transfer to tenants. If it tightens, expect the cost to reroute, through rent where that is legal and through creative fees where it is not. The statute survived its first September. The second one starts now.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who pays the broker fee in Massachusetts now?
The party who hired the broker. Since August 1, 2025, G.L. c. 112, § 87DDD½ requires that a rental broker’s fee be paid only by the party, lessor or tenant, who originally engaged and contracted with the broker. Because listing brokers work for landlords, the landlord pays in almost every transaction. You owe a fee only to a broker you independently retained to search on your behalf.
Can a landlord make me pay it anyway?
No. A landlord or broker cannot require you to pay the fee for a broker the landlord engaged, and cannot condition your application or lease on paying it. A “tenant engagement” form signed as a condition of seeing an advertised unit does not create a genuine exception; the statute looks at who originally engaged the broker, and demanding the fee anyway is an unfair practice under Chapter 93A.
What is an illegal application fee?
Any mandatory upfront charge beyond the four that G.L. c. 186, § 15B allows: first month’s rent, last month’s rent, a security deposit of up to one month’s rent, and the cost of a new lock and key. Mandatory application fees, administrative fees, move-in fees, amenity fees, and pet deposits are all outside that list and illegal for a landlord to require, and that was true even before the broker fee law passed.
How do I get an illegal fee back?
Demand a refund in writing, citing the statute. If that fails, file a complaint with the Attorney General’s Consumer Advocacy and Response Division (hotline 617-727-8400), then send a Chapter 93A demand letter giving 30 days to make a reasonable offer. If the fee is not returned, sue in small claims court for up to $7,000; a court can double or treble the amount for a willful violation and award attorney’s fees.
Does the law apply to leases signed before August 2025?
The fee rule applies to broker fees charged on or after August 1, 2025; a fee lawfully paid before that date is not refundable under this law. A renewal or new lease after the effective date is covered, and relabeled charges such as mandatory application fees were illegal under § 15B long before August 2025, so an older charge of that kind may still be recoverable.