Mississippi County Arkansas Landlord-Tenant Law: Cotton to Steel, America’s #1 Steel County, and What Every Landlord Needs to Know
The economic development organization for Mississippi County calls itself “Cotton to Steel” — and the name is not marketing hyperbole. It is a compressed history of one county’s transformation over roughly a century. Mississippi County was the largest cotton-producing county in the United States between 1932 and 1960. It had 88,000 people in 1938 and 60,000 mules. The Delta bottomland of the Mississippi River’s alluvial plain, among the most fertile agricultural soil in the world, produced cotton at a scale that made the county an agricultural colossus in the American South. Then mechanization arrived, reducing the labor required to grow cotton by orders of magnitude. Then the Eaker Air Force Base closed in 1992, eliminating 9,000 jobs in a county that could not afford to lose them. The population fell. Buildings emptied. The county that had once been the fifth-most-populous in Arkansas shrank below 40,000.
What happened next is one of the more remarkable stories in American rural economic development. Nucor Corporation, recognizing the county’s combination of Mississippi River barge access for scrap metal delivery, rail connections, cheap electricity, and a workforce of displaced farm families with the mechanical aptitude to run steel mills, opened its first Mississippi County plant in 1988 — Nucor-Yamato Steel, a joint venture with Japan’s Yamato Kogyo that manufactures steel beams and structural products. A second Nucor plant (Nucor-Hickman, producing rolled sheet steel) followed in 1992. Big River Steel opened a state-of-the-art mill in Osceola in 2017; U.S. Steel acquired Big River in 2021 and announced a $3.2 billion expansion — the largest private investment in Arkansas history. Mississippi County is now reportedly the largest steel-producing county in the United States, with approximately 5,500 direct steel jobs paying average wages of $90,000 to $165,000 per year.
Screening Steel Mill Workers: High Pay, Important Nuances
For Mississippi County landlords, steel mill workers represent the most economically significant tenant profile in the market. At average wages of $90,000–$165,000 annually, a steel mill worker earning even at the lower end of that range typically clears the 3x monthly rent threshold for almost any rental unit in the county. These workers are W-2 employees with regular pay schedules and stable employment at companies that have made multi-billion-dollar long-term investments in the county.
One nuance worth understanding: during the ongoing U.S. Steel/Big River $3.2 billion expansion at Osceola, a large number of construction workers are employed in the county on a project-duration basis. A construction worker building a steel mill earns W-2 income like a mill worker, but their position ends when the project ends. When screening a steel-industry applicant, confirm whether they hold a permanent operational role at an existing plant or a project-duration construction position. The verification is simple — the employer name on the pay stub will indicate whether it’s Nucor, U.S. Steel, or a construction subcontractor. Both can be good tenants; the income stability profiles are different.
American Greetings: The Other Manufacturing Giant
Osceola hosts another industrial landmark that gets less attention than the steel mills but is remarkable in its own right: the American Greetings manufacturing facility. American Greetings is the world’s largest greeting card producer, and its Osceola plant is the largest manufacturing facility under a single roof in Arkansas — approximately 60 acres of production floor. American Greetings workers are W-2 employees with steady industrial income; screen with base wage documentation and consecutive pay stubs. Denso (automotive components), Tenaris (steel pipe), and Nibco (flow-control products) are among the other manufacturers employing workers in the county.
The Dual Courthouse Filing Rule
Mississippi County’s dual courthouse structure dates to 1901, when the Arkansas Legislature created the Chickasawba Judicial District in the northern part of the county with Blytheville as its courthouse. The Osceola courthouse, built in 1915 and featuring one of the most architecturally distinctive interiors in the state — hand-laid baked stone tile floors in four colors on multiple levels, symmetrical marble and wrought iron staircases, a copper dome, and a first floor sealed against Mississippi River flooding — serves the southern district and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Blytheville courthouse features marble and mahogany woodwork and received a significant addition between 2022 and 2024.
For landlords, the rule is straightforward but important: file your Unlawful Detainer in the courthouse for the district where the rental property is located. Blytheville courthouse, 200 W. Walnut, handles the north district; Osceola handles the south district. Circuit Clerk Leslie Mason serves both courthouses. If you file in the wrong courthouse, the case may need to be re-filed in the correct district, delaying the process. Call either courthouse to confirm the district for your property before filing.
Big Lake NWR and Wilson’s Tudor Village
Two distinctive places in Mississippi County are worth noting for landlords considering the full character of the market. Big Lake National Wildlife Refuge, established by President Woodrow Wilson in 1915, is the oldest federal refuge in Arkansas and a premier waterfowl hunting destination in the Delta. Properties near Manila and Big Lake may have modest seasonal STR potential during duck season.
Wilson, Arkansas, is a company town founded in 1886 by R.E. Lee Wilson to support a logging and sawmill operation and later a cotton empire. In 1925, Wilson’s son honeymooned in England and returned to rebuild the entire community in Tudor Revival architecture. Today, driving through Wilson on US Highway 61, visitors encounter an improbable cluster of English half-timbered buildings in the heart of the Mississippi Delta — a community that was sold off lot by lot only in 1959 and has been revitalized in recent years as a boutique agricultural heritage destination.
Arkansas Landlord-Tenant Law in Mississippi County
All residential rental relationships in Mississippi County are governed entirely by statewide Arkansas law — A.C.A. §§ 18-16-101 through 18-16-108 and the Arkansas Residential Landlord-Tenant Act of 2007, A.C.A. §§ 18-17-101 et seq. There is no local rent control, no just-cause eviction requirement, and no landlord licensing requirement in Blytheville, Osceola, or Mississippi County.
For nonpayment of rent, serve a written 3-day notice to vacate after rent is at least 5 days past due. For lease violations other than nonpayment, serve a 14-day notice to cure or quit. Month-to-month tenancies require 30 days’ written notice to terminate; week-to-week require 7 days. Security deposits are capped at two months’ rent for landlords with six or more rental units and must be returned with written itemized deductions within 60 days of lease termination. Arkansas does not impose a default implied warranty of habitability; tenants have no repair-and-deduct remedy. Abandoned property may be disposed of after lease termination. Self-help evictions are prohibited.
All evictions are filed with Circuit Clerk Leslie Mason at the courthouse for the applicable district: Blytheville, (870) 762-2332, or Osceola, (870) 563-6471. Mississippi County is a wet county.
This guide is provided for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Arkansas landlord-tenant law is governed by the Arkansas Code Annotated and applies statewide, with no local rent control or just-cause eviction requirements in Mississippi County. Consult a licensed Arkansas attorney or contact the 2nd Judicial Circuit Court Clerk at (870) 762-2332 (Blytheville) or (870) 563-6471 (Osceola) for guidance specific to your situation. Last updated: March 2026.
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