Free tool · Phoenix / Maricopa County
What does a squatter cost you in Arizona?
Change the numbers to match your property. The rent is Arizona's own, from HUD; how long it drags on is your call; everything else is yours to overwrite.
Arizona estimate
$37,432
Your numbers.
These are national starting points, not claims about your property. The one figure that drives the total — how long it drags on — is yours to set. Nobody can source it, so we do not pretend to.
How long before you get it back?
6 months
Your assumption, not ours — courts do not publish how long this takes. A contested removal runs in months, not weeks, almost everywhere; how it goes in Arizona is in the guide.
How many bedrooms?
Sets the rent from HUD’s published Fair Market Rent for Phoenix / Maricopa County — $2,452/mo.
Mortgage / loan payment — per month
$
Only you know this one. The placeholder is roughly a $300k loan at current rates.
Lost rent or delayed sale — per month
$
HUD's Fair Market Rent for this metro, at the bedroom count you picked. It is the 40th percentile of recent-mover rents, so on a renovated or market-rate property it is a floor, not a valuation.
Attorney fees — one-off
$
No public data exists. Our estimate — nothing published backs it. No state bar and no court in any of these markets publishes fee data for an ejectment. Get a written quote and put it here.
Property taxes — per month
$
Your bill, divided by twelve. The placeholder is roughly a $250k property at Philadelphia's 1.3998% — Newark runs 1.845%, Los Angeles 1.187%.
Insurance — per month
$
No public data exists. Our estimate. Vacant cover genuinely does cost more, but the published figures for how much more disagree by a factor of five — anywhere from +25% to 5x. Use your own premium.
Utilities — per month
$
A national placeholder, unless your state overrides it below — Philadelphia's is the Water Department's own published bill. Whoever is inside, you are the ratepayer of record.
Damage and clean-out — one-off
$
No public data exists. Our estimate, and we want to be blunt: NO government body in the United States publishes squatter-damage data. Every figure you have seen quoted traces to one news story or to a lobby survey that counted houses, not dollars. We are not going to launder a number we cannot stand behind — put yours here.
If it happens in Arizona
$37,432
at 6 months— and every extra month adds $4,822.
Against a $0–$120k range, so the bar means something as you drag.
Carrying it, empty ($4,822/mo × 6 mo)
$28,932
One-off costs (attorney, damage)
$8,500
What ruins you is the carry — the months. On top of this you will pay to file, for the sheriff to serve and remove, and for a lawyer. Those are set locally and we do not print a number we cannot cite — but next to the months, they are a sliver.
Can you get any of it back? YES — Arizona is the outlier, and it is clean. Note 'attorney fees' sits parallel to 'damages' and 'costs' — it is not conditioned on a rental agreement, and the verb is 'shall'. But two catches: a judgment against a broke squatter is paper, and § 12-1178(B) means an owner who LOSES pays the occupant's fees.
Why Arizona costs what it does
Arizona is one of the fastest states here, and uniquely, it is the one place where the law actually says you get your attorney's fees back. But there is a live trap: SB 1426 was signed in May 2026 and does not take effect until 12 September 2026. Anything you read about Arizona's new squatter rules is describing a law that is not yet in force.
The statute
A.R.S. § 12-1171 et seq. (forcible entry and detainer)
SB 1426 adds a new squatter subsection and requires a writ of restitution to issue immediately after judgment — but it is NOT LAW UNTIL 12 SEPTEMBER 2026. Do not rely on it before then.
Rent, by bedroom
1 bed $1,583 · 2 bed $1,839 · 3 bed $2,452 · 4 bed $2,720
Verified verbatim against the cited HUD PDF, page 2. HUD's FMR area is 'Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ MSA' covering Maricopa and Pinal counties; 0BR is $1457.
Do you get your legal fees back?
YES — Arizona is the outlier, and it is clean
“the court shall give judgment for the plaintiff for restitution of the premises, for all charges stated in the rental agreement and for damages, attorney fees, court and other costs”
Note 'attorney fees' sits parallel to 'damages' and 'costs' — it is not conditioned on a rental agreement, and the verb is 'shall'. But two catches: a judgment against a broke squatter is paper, and § 12-1178(B) means an owner who LOSES pays the occupant's fees.
The Governor vetoed the sheriff-affidavit bill on due-process grounds. The bill that did pass took the court route instead and gives law enforcement no removal authority.
This is the bill for finding out too late.
Nothing on this page will get an occupant out, and be wary of anyone who says otherwise. What DeedProof does is earlier and duller: it verifies you own the property, structures the statement you swear before a notary, and files it — so that if someone does break in, the officer at the door has something to work from instead of a lease they cannot check.
The decision still belongs to the officer. Our job is to make it an easy one.
This page is the money. The law behind it is on Arizona’s guide — whether police can arrest, whether a sheriff can act on your affidavit alone, and how long occupation takes to become a claim. Every answer quoted from the statute.