New Texas Law Allowing Tenants’ Access to Firearms – Effective Sept 1

There are several new laws impacting the rights of Texans to have access and carry firearms.  The specific law impacting all landlords, including manufactured home community owners, is HB 302.

H.B. 302 provides that tenants of a residential unit (apartment, condominium, and manufactured housing) have the right to lawfully possess firearms and ammunition in those locations, and to transport them directly en route between their residential units and their vehicles.

The statutory changes to Chapter 94, Property Code, specific for manufactured home communities are as follows:

Sec. 94.257.  POSSESSION OF FIREARM OR FIREARM AMMUNITION ON LEASED PREMISES. Unless possession of a firearm or firearm ammunition on a landlord's property is prohibited by state or federal law, a landlord may not prohibit a tenant or a tenant's guest from lawfully possessing, carrying, transporting, or storing a firearm, any part of a firearm, or firearm ammunition:

(1)  in the tenant's manufactured home;

(2)  in a vehicle located in a parking area provided for tenants or tenants' guests by the landlord of the leased premises; or

(3)  in other locations controlled by the landlord as necessary to:

(A)  enter or exit the tenant's manufactured home;

(B)  enter or exit the leased premises; or

(C)  enter or exit a vehicle on the leased premises or located in a parking area provided by the landlord for tenants or tenants' guests.

This law change may require modification of existing lease contracts depending on if the lease contracts or the community rules had any prohibitions on tenants possessing firearms.