Montgomery County, Arkansas Eviction Risk: Low

Montgomery County, Arkansas scores 1.9/10 on the eviction-risk index, placing it in the Low risk tier. Across all 6 tracked cities, the county sits at rank 40 of 75 Arkansas eviction laws counties, meaning 39 counties carry higher risk and 35 are more landlord-friendly, putting Montgomery squarely in the middle third of the state. For landlords, that Low aggregate score reflects a small rental market, with an average rent of $595 and a renter share of 39.5%, where eviction filings are relatively infrequent and tenant-side legal infrastructure is thin.

That said, the intra-county range runs from 1.5 to 2.1, a spread that matters when the entire county's tracked population is just 2,241. Even modest concentrations of cost-burdened renters, with an average rent burden of 38.3%, can move risk meaningfully at the city level. Landlords evaluating individual properties should treat the county average as a floor estimate, not a guarantee.

The cities inside Montgomery County

Norman carries the highest risk in the county at 2.1/10 with a population of 339. Mount Ida, the county seat and largest city at 1,376 residents, scores 2/10, as does the smaller community of Pencil Bluff at 51 residents. These three cities cluster at the top of the local range and account for the bulk of rental activity in the county.

On the lower end, Black Springs scores 1.5/10 (population 101), and both Oden at 1.6/10 (population 347) and Caddo Gap at 1.6/10 (population 27) sit well below the county average. The gap between Norman at 2.1 and Black Springs at 1.5 illustrates how hyper-local risk can be in rural markets where a handful of rental units can shift the profile of an entire community. Landlords with holdings spread across Norman and Black Springs are effectively operating in two meaningfully different risk environments despite sharing the same county boundary.

State-level laws that apply here

All Montgomery County landlords operate under Ark. Code § 18-17 (Residential Landlord-Tenant Act). Arkansas eviction laws state law sets notice requirements at 3 days for non-payment of rent, 14 days for a lease violation with opportunity to cure, and 30 days for a no-cause end-of-term termination. Uncontested cases typically resolve in 30 to 60 days; contested matters can run 90 to 150 days. Understanding the full Arkansas eviction laws eviction process before filing is essential, because even an uncontested case carries a court filing fee of $165 to $250, a sheriff lockout fee of $40 to $120, and attorney fees that commonly range from $500 to $2,500. Reviewing Arkansas eviction costs in detail will help landlords budget realistically for a worst-case scenario.

Arkansas eviction laws does not require just cause for eviction and the state preempts any local rent-control ordinance, so there are no rent caps or additional just-cause hoops at the county level. Source-of-income is not a protected class under Arkansas eviction laws fair housing law as administered by the Arkansas eviction laws Fair Housing Commission, giving landlords broader tenant-selection flexibility than exists in many other states.

With a poverty rate of 25.5% and a renter share of 39.5%, Montgomery County's Low aggregate risk still warrants city-level scrutiny; review the individual city scores in the grid above to pinpoint where within the county that risk concentrates.