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When The Landlord Retaliates

ORC 5321.02 — three protected acts, three prohibited responses

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The retaliation section is built as a pairing. Three things a tenant may do, and three things a landlord may not do because the tenant did them. Both halves have to be present for the section to apply, which is why it is written out this way rather than as a general ban on landlords behaving badly.

What the tenant didWhat the landlord may not do because of it
Complained to a government agency of a building, housing, health or safety code violation materially affecting health and safetyIncrease the rent
Complained to the landlord of a violation of ORC 5321.04Decrease services due to the tenant
Joined with other tenants to negotiate or deal collectively on the terms of a rental agreementBring or threaten to bring an action for possession
The complaint to a government agency has a qualifier on it. The protected complaint is of a violation of a building, housing, health or safety code applicable to the premises where the violation materially affects health and safety. Materially affects health and safety is a condition in the sentence, not decoration, and it is the part a landlord will argue about.

Where a landlord acts in violation of the section, the tenant may use the retaliatory action as a defence to the landlord's action to recover possession of the premises. That is a defence inside an eviction case rather than a separate lawsuit, which matters because the eviction case is usually what is moving first. In addition, the tenant may recover actual damages together with reasonable attorney's fees.

A rent increase is not retaliation merely because it followed a complaint. The section says plainly that nothing in it prohibits a landlord from increasing the rent to reflect the cost of improvements installed in or about the premises, or to reflect an increase in other costs of operating the premises. A landlord with a documented cost has a documented answer, and timing alone does not decide it.

This page does not say how retaliation is proved, what evidence a court looks for, or how close in time the landlord's response has to be. It does not cover which tenancies the landlord and tenant chapter reaches, and some do not fall under it. Where an eviction case is already filed, the deadlines in that case run regardless of the strength of any defence. Legal aid organisations across Ohio handle eviction defence, and whether a particular response was retaliatory is a question for the court hearing it and for a licensed Ohio attorney.

Sources for this section (2)
  1. ORC 5321.02 — Retaliatory action by a landlord prohibited
  2. ORC 5321.04 — Landlord obligations, including notice before entry

Legal information, not legal advice. Verified as of September 2026. Talk to a licensed Ohio attorney about your situation.

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Sections that share statutes or vocabulary with this one. Most questions turn out to sit across two of them.