When Your Landlord Comes In
ORC 5321.04 — the other door question, and a different chapter
There are two completely different questions about a landlord and a door, and this site answers both in different places because they come from different bodies of law. Whether a landlord can let police into a tenant's home is a constitutional question, and the answer is on the page about who can let them in. Whether the landlord can come in themselves is a contract and statute question, and it is this one.
The chapter gives a landlord a right of entry and then conditions it. Except in an emergency, or where giving notice is impracticable, a landlord must give the tenant reasonable notice of an intent to enter and must enter only at reasonable times. The statute supplies a benchmark for the first part: twenty four hours is presumed to be reasonable notice, absent evidence to the contrary.
- The tenant side of the same arrangement is that a tenant shall not unreasonably withhold consent for the landlord to enter.
- So both halves are written in the language of reasonableness, and neither one is an absolute.
- A landlord entering in an emergency is outside the notice requirement entirely.
| What the landlord did | What the section reaches | What it allows the tenant |
|---|---|---|
| Entered in violation of the notice and timing rules | Unlawful entry | Actual damages, injunctive relief, reasonable attorney's fees, or termination of the rental agreement |
| Entered lawfully but in an unreasonable manner | Named separately in the same division | The same remedies |
| Made repeated demands for entry that harass the tenant | Named separately again | The same remedies |
The third row is the one people do not expect. Harassment by repeated demands is written into the statute as its own wrong, so a landlord who asks and asks and never actually enters is not outside the section by virtue of never having come in.
Remedies here are civil and are pursued by the tenant, in a court, after the fact. Nothing in this chapter is enforced at the door, and what a specific lease adds on top of the statute is its own question for a licensed Ohio attorney.
Sources for this section (4)
- ORC 5321.04 — Landlord obligations, including notice before entry
- ORC 5321.05 — Tenant obligations, including not unreasonably withholding consent
- Chapman v. United States, 365 U.S. 610 (1961) — A landlord cannot consent to a search of a tenant's home
- U.S. Const. amend. IV — Searches and seizures
Legal information, not legal advice. Verified as of September 2026. Talk to a licensed Ohio attorney about your situation.