Advance Rent and Holding Deposits in Victoria: What Landlords Can and Cannot Charge

A prospective renter wants to lock in the property and offers to pay six months upfront. It sounds like a safe bet — but if the weekly rent is $900 or less and rent is payable monthly, accepting more than one month's rent in advance is prohibited. For weekly payments, you cannot require more than two weeks in advance. And that holding deposit you used to take? Also banned.

What Victoria Bans Outright

Three charges that landlords in other states or countries routinely collect are prohibited in Victoria:

Holding deposits. A rental provider cannot accept any payment to "hold" a property while processing an application. There is no workaround — not a smaller amount, not a refundable deposit, not a payment labelled as anything else.

Application fees. Charging a prospective renter for processing their tenancy application is unlawful. This applies whether the fee goes to the landlord, an agent, or a third-party screening service.

Third-party platform fees charged to renters. Effective 31 March 2026, it's a statutory offence for application management or rent collection platforms to charge renters transaction or processing fees. The landlord can use these platforms, but the renter cannot be billed for them.

The maximum penalty for charging prohibited platform or application fees is up to 60 penalty units — $12,546 in FY 2026–27.

Advance Rent Caps

Victoria treats advance rent separately from the bond. The caps depend on the weekly rent amount and payment frequency:

Weekly rent of $900 or less, paid weekly: The landlord cannot require more than 2 weeks' rent in advance.

Weekly rent of $900 or less, paid monthly: The landlord cannot require more than 1 month's rent in advance. Even if the renter voluntarily offers more, accepting it is prohibited.

Weekly rent above $900: The advance rent cap doesn't apply. Landlords can invite and accept more than one month's advance rent.

The critical point: the $900 threshold is the same one that governs bond caps. If your property's weekly rent is at or below $900, the bond is capped at one calendar month's rent, while advance rent is capped at two weeks if payable weekly or one month if payable monthly.

How Advance Rent Differs from Bond

The bond goes to the RTBA and sits in trust until the tenancy ends. Advance rent goes to the landlord and covers upcoming rental periods — it's consumed as each period passes.

They're separate obligations with separate caps, and collecting one doesn't reduce the other. A landlord can collect a one-month bond and one month's advance rent for a property renting at $600/week when rent is payable monthly (or up to two weeks' advance if paid weekly), but cannot exceed either individual cap.

What This Means for Self-Managing Landlords

If you're coming from interstate or from a commercial leasing background, Victoria's restrictions are stricter than you might expect. The state has deliberately eliminated upfront financial barriers for renters beyond the bond and first month's rent.

For self-managing landlords, the practical impact is straightforward:

1. Collect the bond (maximum one calendar month's rent if weekly rent is $900 or less)
2. Collect up to two weeks' advance rent if paid weekly, or one month's advance rent if paid monthly (when weekly rent is $900 or less)
3. Collect nothing else — no holding deposit or application fee, and provide each renter with a free key or security device

If a renter offers to pay months ahead, explain that Victorian law caps what you can accept. The offer might be genuine, but accepting it creates a statutory breach regardless of intent.

The Victoria Rental Bond guide covers the full breakdown of what you can and can't collect at the start of a tenancy, with the bond cap calculation and advance rent rules side by side.

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