Arkansas Landlord Compliance · End a tenancy
Arkansas Unlawful Squatting Law 2025: New Criminal Offense
Arkansas property owners can now involve law enforcement directly when someone occupies their property without any right to be there, instead of relying solely on the civil eviction process. HB 1049, enacted as Act 238 of 2025, creates a new criminal offense at Ark. Code 5-39-215 called unlawful squatting.
Written by PlatuniThe short answer
- 1.Unlawful squatting is defined as entering and residing in a premises when the person is not privileged or licensed to do so.
- 2.The law explicitly excludes a current tenant at the premises and anyone with a valid agreement to occupy it.
- 3.The statute is silent on former or holdover tenants, people whose lease has expired but who haven't moved out; it doesn't say whether they're covered or excluded.
- 4.Penalties escalate: a first offense is a Class B misdemeanor, a second is a Class A misdemeanor, and a third is a Class D felony.
- 5.Providing false occupancy documents to avoid the offense is separately a Class D felony.
- 6.This creates a faster, criminal-process option alongside the existing civil eviction process; it doesn't replace civil eviction for tenancy disputes.
This covers
- · Property owners dealing with someone who entered and is occupying a premises with no privilege, license, or agreement to be there
- · Situations where speed matters, since a criminal report can move faster than a civil eviction's court hearings and writs of possession
- · Anyone providing forged or false documents claiming a right to occupy
Usually exempt
- · A current tenant at the premises under an active lease
- · Anyone with a valid agreement to occupy the premises, even an informal one, as long as it's genuine
- · Former or holdover tenants, at least arguably; the statute doesn't explicitly resolve this, see the note below
1. What the new offense actually covers
Act 238 creates a new criminal offense, unlawful squatting, defined as entering and residing unlawfully in a premises when the person entering and residing is not privileged or licensed to do so. This lives at a new section, Ark. Code 5-39-215, inside the criminal code rather than the residential landlord-tenant statutes.
[Cite: Act 238 of 2025 (HB 1049), Ark. Code 5-39-215]
The statute explicitly carves out two categories from the offense: a current tenant at the premises, and anyone with a valid agreement to occupy the premises. Someone who fits either category isn't committing unlawful squatting, regardless of whether a landlord considers their presence unwanted for other reasons.
[Cite: Ark. Code 5-39-215]
2. The gap the statute leaves open
The enacted text doesn't address former or holdover tenants, people whose lease has expired or been terminated but who haven't vacated. This matters because a holdover tenant isn't clearly a "current tenant" under an active lease, but they also aren't someone who simply broke into a property with no prior relationship to it at all.
This gap was raised during the bill's committee hearing. An attorney testifying on the bill warned its language could sweep too broadly, citing an example of someone subletting a property whose rent wasn't properly passed through to the owner, and recommended the bill add a minimum time-on-premises threshold and defenses drawn from existing criminal trespass law. Those changes don't appear to have made it into the final enacted text.
[Cite: Arkansas Advocate, committee hearing coverage, February 2025]
Because the statute doesn't resolve this, a landlord dealing with a holdover tenant should treat that situation as a civil eviction matter rather than assume the criminal squatting statute applies. Using a criminal report against someone with any arguable prior tenancy relationship carries real risk if that person later shows they had a colorable claim to occupy the property.
3. Penalties, and how they escalate
A first unlawful squatting offense is a Class B misdemeanor. A second offense is a Class A misdemeanor, a step up in severity. A third offense becomes a Class D felony. Separately, providing false documents to claim a right to occupy the premises is its own Class D felony, regardless of how many prior squatting offenses a person has.
[Cite: Ark. Code 5-39-215]
This escalating structure means the criminal consequences for repeat unauthorized occupation grow substantially more serious with each subsequent offense, moving from misdemeanor territory into felony exposure by the third instance.
4. How this differs from civil eviction, and why owners wanted it
Arkansas's existing civil eviction process for tenancy disputes involves court hearings, a writ of possession, and what can be a lengthy timeline before a property owner regains possession. The legislative sponsor of this bill specifically pointed to that slower process as the reason for creating a criminal alternative, one that allows law enforcement to remove someone from a property more immediately when there's no tenancy relationship to dispute in the first place.
[Cite: Arkansas Advocate, committee hearing coverage, February 2025]
This is why the current-tenant and valid-agreement exclusions matter so much. The statute is built for situations with no legitimate occupancy claim at all, not as a faster substitute for evicting someone a landlord has an actual, if soured, tenancy relationship with.
5. The reporting and immunity provisions
Reports under this statute must come from the premises owner or an authorized representative of the owner, not from a third party with no connection to the property. Law enforcement officers acting in good faith when responding to and acting on such a report have immunity from liability for that response.
[Cite: Ark. Code 5-39-215]
6. Effective date
The act contains no effective-date clause or emergency clause in the text reviewed. Following Arkansas's general constitutional rule for acts without an emergency clause, it took effect 91 days after the legislature's sine die adjournment, placing the effective date at August 5, 2025.
[Cite: Ark. Const. art. 5, section 1]
Reading this as a tenant?
If you have a lease, an informal rental agreement, or any documented right to be at a property, this criminal statute doesn't apply to you; you're a tenant or licensee, not a squatter, and any dispute with your landlord runs through the normal civil eviction process. If your lease has expired and you haven't moved out, the law doesn't clearly say where you stand, so that situation should still be handled as a civil matter, not treated as criminal squatting.
Sources and review
- 1.Arkansas Act 238 of 2025 (HB 1049), enacted text, Ark. Code 5-39-215.
- 2.Arkansas Advocate, "Bill to criminalize unlawful squatting moves through Arkansas committee," February 2025.
- 3.Arkansas Constitution, article 5, section 1, general effective-date rule for acts without an emergency clause.
Substantive review means an editor re-checked each cited section against the current code, not that the page was re-saved. Corrections: compliance@platuni.com.
Frequently asked questions
Can a landlord use this law against a tenant who stopped paying rent?
No. The statute explicitly excludes a current tenant at the premises. Non-payment of rent is a civil eviction matter, not unlawful squatting, as long as the tenancy relationship itself is genuine.
What happens if someone's lease expired but they never left?
The statute doesn't clearly say. This holdover situation falls into a gap between the current-tenant exclusion and the offense definition, so it should be treated as a civil eviction matter rather than assumed to fall under this criminal law.
Does providing a forged lease protect someone from this charge?
No, the opposite. Providing false documents claiming a right to occupy the premises is a separate Class D felony under this statute, regardless of the underlying squatting allegation.
How is this different from criminal trespass, which already existed in Arkansas?
This creates a specific offense tied to entering and residing in a premises without privilege or license, with its own escalating penalty structure. It's meant to give property owners and law enforcement a more direct tool for occupation situations, alongside whatever existing trespass law already covered.
Who can actually file a report under this law?
Only the premises owner or someone authorized to act on the owner's behalf. The statute doesn't extend reporting authority to unrelated third parties.