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Missouri

Missouri · home improvement

Your rights in Missouri

Information, not legal adviceRules checked Oct 4, 2026

3 business days to cancel

If sold at your home on credit

Cancel in writing by midnight of the third business day. Cash sales at home fall under the federal 3-day rule instead.

Some sales are excepted, such as emergency work you ask for, once it has begun.

The 2 exceptions, in the rule's words
  • Emergency: you cannot cancel if you asked for the goods or services without delay because of an emergency and the seller in good faith made a substantial start on the work before your notice. If goods are involved, they must also be impossible to return in substantially as good condition as when you got them. The statute joins these conditions with 'and'.
  • Sales made under a preexisting revolving charge account, or after prior negotiations by both parties at the seller's fixed business location, are not home solicitation sales.
Read the full rule

When it applies

The seller personally solicited the sale at your home, you signed or made your offer there, and the sale is on credit (Missouri's statute covers a 'consumer credit sale'). Sales under an existing revolving charge account, or made after earlier negotiations at the seller's fixed place of business, are not covered. A cash sale made at your home falls under the federal FTC Cooling-Off Rule instead (3 business days, purchases of $25 or more).

If a seller came to your home and you signed a credit sale there, Missouri lets you cancel in writing until midnight of the third business day after you sign. Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays don't count. The seller must return your payments within 10 days. Cash sales of $25 or more made at your home are covered by the federal 3-business-day Cooling-Off Rule, which counts Saturdays as business days. If an insurance claim is paying for roof or other exterior work, you can also cancel within 5 business days after your insurer tells you in writing that all or part of the claim is not covered.

RSMo 407.705 · read on revisor.mo.gov · checked Oct 4, 2026 (official source, opens in a new tab)

The contract must include

Source: MO law

An estimate isn't the contract. Ask for all 4 in writing before you sign.

  • Notice of cancellationIf sold at your home on credit: show the rule's own words

    In the rule's words

    For a credit sale a seller solicited at your home (unless you asked for the work without delay because of an emergency): be a written agreement dated the day you sign, with a 'NOTICE OF CANCELLATION' in 10-point bold type that has the transaction date and the seller's name and mailing address filled in. A contract that uses the FTC's cancellation notice also complies, as long as it gives you at least as much information.

  • Notice to Owner about liensBefore they take any payment: show the rule's own words

    In the rule's words

    Before the contractor takes any payment, you must get the written 'NOTICE TO OWNER' about mechanic's liens in 10-point bold type. It can come at signing, when materials are delivered, when work starts or with the first invoice. The notice tells you that you may ask for lien waivers from everyone who supplies materials or services.

  • "Consent of Owner" kept apartSigning it opens your home to liens: show the rule's own words

    In the rule's words

    On repair, remodeling or an addition to an owner-occupied home of four units or fewer, any 'CONSENT OF OWNER' must be printed in 10-point bold type and signed separately from the lien notice. Signing it lets unpaid subcontractors and suppliers file mechanic's liens on your home. Without it, paying the contractor in full is a complete defense to their liens.

  • Insurance-claim cancel noticeRoof or exterior work paid by insurance: show the rule's own words

    In the rule's words

    For roof or other exterior work paid through a property insurance claim: include a 10-point bold statement of your right to cancel within 5 business days after your insurer tells you in writing that all or part of the claim is not covered, plus a fully completed, detachable 'NOTICE OF CANCELLATION' form in duplicate.

On signing day

  • Keep a signed copy
  • Find the cancel notice
Sources19 official pages · checked Oct 4, 2026

Notes from our check

  • Deposit: none of the official sources reviewed limits the deposit or down payment on a home improvement contract (RSMo 407.700-407.725, 429.012-429.013, and the Attorney General's door-to-door page and 'Know Your Rights' guide). depositCap is null, so the app must not state a Missouri cap and must not infer one from other states. The Attorney General's guide advises 'pay no more than 25 percent' in advance. That is consumer advice, not a legal limit.
  • Cancellation scope: RSMo 407.700 defines a home solicitation sale as a 'consumer credit sale' of goods or services solicited at the buyer's residence. Sections 407.700-407.720 do not define 'consumer credit sale', and the rest of the RSMo was not searched for a definition. The Attorney General's door-to-door page and guide instead say the right covers 'any contract' the seller personally solicited and presented in your home, with no credit limit. Because of this difference, the entry treats the state right as covering credit sales and points cash sales to the federal rule. That is the cautious reading: the federal deadline is never later than Missouri's.
  • Federal fallback for cash sales: the FTC Cooling-Off Rule (16 CFR Part 429, read on ecfr.gov) gives 3 business days for sales of $25 or more at the buyer's home ($130 or more at other temporary locations). Its business day counts Saturdays (only Sundays and federal holidays are excluded), and refunds are due within 10 business days. The federal rule excludes buyer-initiated emergencies where the buyer gives a handwritten, signed waiver, and buyer-requested visits to repair or maintain the buyer's personal property. It does not cancel state laws that give the buyer the same or greater rights (16 CFR 429.2).
  • Missouri cancellation details from the statute text: notice must be written but need not take any particular form, and a mailed notice counts when it is deposited in a mailbox (407.705). Until the seller provides the required notice, the buyer may cancel by any means (407.710.3). If the seller performed services before the cancellation, the seller is entitled to no compensation (407.720.3). The emergency exception in 407.705.3 joins its conditions with 'and'. Its third condition (goods cannot be returned in substantially as good condition) is limited to 'the case of goods', so for a services-only contract the first two conditions are enough to block cancellation. The AG's PDF guide lists the three conditions as bullets without that word.
  • Insurance-paid work (RSMo 407.725) is a separate right that starts from a different event, so it is not entered as extendedDays. Its rule: 5 business days after the insurer's written notice that all or part of the claim is not covered. Subsection 5 says payments are returned within 10 days, but the statute's own notice form says 'within ten business days following receipt' of the cancellation notice. The contractor may keep only the reasonable value of emergency services the insured acknowledged in writing as necessary to prevent damage. The same section bars contractors from promising to pay or rebate any part of your insurance deductible and from negotiating your insurance claim for you. Violations are unfair practices under the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act. This section covers contractors doing roof or other exterior work on residential or commercial structures.
  • Registration is null: no statewide general contractor or home-improvement license or registration was found. The board list of the Division of Professional Registration (pr.mo.gov/boards.asp) has no general, home-improvement, plumbing or HVAC contractor board. Its only contractor board is Electrical Contractors, and that office's FAQ says its license is 'optional, not mandatory' (RSMo 324.920.4). The Attorney General's guide tells homeowners to check county and local permits and to ask whether the contractor is licensed, bonded and insured. The app should send homeowners to their city or county for licensing and permits, not name a state credential.
  • Lien notice: RSMo 429.012 makes the notice a condition for the original contractor's own mechanic's lien. Failing to give it with intent to defraud is a class B misdemeanor. Subsection 4 exempts new residences where the buyer has lien protection through a Missouri-registered title insurance company.
  • Septic and well: the state credentials cover building, repairing or plugging water, heat pump and monitoring wells and installing well pumps (DNR permit), and installing a new onsite wastewater system or doing a major modification or repair (DHSS registration). Whether routine septic pumping or maintenance needs a state credential was not checked.
  • Access limits (verification on 2026-10-04): revisor.mo.gov also blocked this verifier's IP address. The statute text was read from Internet Archive copies of the same revisor.mo.gov pages: 407.700 (15 Apr 2026), 407.705 (15 Aug 2025), 407.710 (27 Apr 2022), 407.715 (5 Oct 2025), 407.720 (10 Jan 2026), 407.725 (10 Jul 2026), 429.012 and 429.013 (11 Jul 2026) and 324.920 (15 Jan 2026). Each copy shows the section's effective date: 1973 for 407.700, 407.710, 407.715 and 407.720; 1986 for 407.705; 2014 for 407.725; 1 Jan 2017 for 429.012 and 429.013; 2018 for 324.920. A change that took effect on 28 Aug 2026 would not appear in copies made before that date. Chapters 281 (pesticides) and 701 (onsite wastewater) were not read, so the pest-control and septic decisions rest on the agencies' own pages. Web search was unavailable, so an official Missouri page on home improvement could have been missed. A person should open the revisor links once to confirm the current text.

General information from official Missouri sources. For your situation, ask the state's consumer protection office or a lawyer.

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