End of tenancy help

bitsandpieces

Shelter info on common law tenancies is worth a look http://scotland.shelter.org.uk/getadvice/advice_topics/renting_rights/common_law_tenancies

I think - but am not sure - that even under a common law tenancy you could refuse all viewings. This might leave you room to negotiate - e.g. offer to allow viewings if LL lets you stay until mid-Nov.

Imelda

nembot wrote: »

The landlord must give two months notice to end a tenancy (even if outside of AST, i.e. rolling) if he tries to evict you in one month - he will be commiting a criminal offence.

The law is the law, no matter what the agreement suggests.

He must also give notice in advance of the regular monthly payment date or it'll be 3 months (minus a day or so).

They're trying it on, be calm but make sure they understand.

Have you got a source for this? We're not AST as our rent is above the threshold...

Imelda

bitsandpieces wrote: »

Shelter info on common law tenancies is worth a look http://scotland.shelter.org.uk/getadvice/advice_topics/renting_rights/common_law_tenancies

I think - but am not sure - that even under a common law tenancy you could refuse all viewings. This might leave you room to negotiate - e.g. offer to allow viewings if LL lets you stay until mid-Nov.

Thanks for the link, will have to look at England though as the law may be different

tbs624

Can you dither about a bit, playing for time?

You are right that s21s are not applicable to your tenancy. However, on Oct 1st the rent threshold raises from 25k per annum to 100k per annum and your common law tenancy will fall under AST rules. Your LL may not be aware of this

bitsandpieces

Imelda wrote: »

Thanks for the link, will have to look at England though as the law may be different

You should definitely look at England. Sorry - no idea why Scotland came up first in Google (should have noticed!)

Imelda

tbs624 wrote: »

Can you dither about a bit, playing for time?

You are right that s21s are not applicable to your tenancy. However, on Oct 1st the rent threshold raises from 25k per annum to 100k per annum and your common law tenancy will fall under AST rules. Your LL may not be aware of this

Nope, notice just plopped through the letterbox. Funny how EAs can get their harris's into gear when there are new fees to be had....

I just KNEW we should have waited. Ah well, maybe the Karma fairies will ensure he has rubbish tenants next time

I think DH and I will be getting acquainted with a few friends' and families' sofas :mad:

N79

nembot wrote: »

The landlord must give two months notice to end a tenancy (even if outside of AST, i.e. rolling) if he tries to evict you in one month - he will be commiting a criminal offence.

Rubbish I'm afraid. This is a common law tenancy. 2 month provision only applies to ATs, ASTs and the Statutory Periodic tenancies that arise from them.

N79

Imelda wrote: »

:mad: :mad: :mad:

I now realise how INCREDIBILY stupid we have been.

We thought it was only right to give our LL as much info as possible about our plans to prepare him, after 2.5yrs, to re let his property.

He is going to serve our 1mth notice today so we have to leave 17th October.

IF our purchase goes ahead the Vendors want to complete around the half term at the end of October.

Brilliant.

If only we had kept our mouths shut for a week or two we could have easily managed to move from one to the other and even have a decent overlap to get some works done.

I am so frustrated by all of this. I wanna move home to my mum

Now: practicalities. I am so pished off by our LL, we thought we were doing the right thing giving him the heads up and so, I guess, expected some kind of leeway back :rotfl:
Well, the gloves are now off.

Can someone enlighten me on the rules regarding allowing viewings etc? ie, the following:

• notice periods
• can I insist on being present (after all, all our things are here)
• can we restrict times of day ie meal times/ evenings? my DH works long hours and the last thing he needs at 9pm is a trail of people poking around.

Thanks

There is scope for you to dither about and make a mess here on the following grounds. Don't worry, you are going to be saved from your stupidity.

1. Your tenancy will convert to an AST on the 1 Oct. Therefore your notice to quit will no longer be valid and your LL will need to serve you with a S21 notice. Since this can not be served until the 1st Oct the earliest that it could expire is the 18th December. Note that a court may take a different interpretation of the above but it will take your LL much longer than 2 months to get a court to decide!

2. Even under a common law tenancy you have protection from eviction under the protection from illegal eviction act thus your LL can not force you to leave without a court order. Thus, if you stay put, your LL will need to go to court which will take longer than 2 months!

So my advice would be (assuming property is in England) to write to your LL along the following lines (I'm sure there are a few typos and spelling errors for you to sort).

============================================

We are writing to inform you that your notice to quit of XXXX date is not valid as our tenancy will become a statutory periodic tenancy on the 1st Oct in accordance with The Assured Tenancies (Amendment)(England) Order 2010 and thus we will gain the protections afforded by S5 of the Housing Act 1988.

In accordance with the Housing Act 1988 as amended you will need to serve us with a notice under Section 21 of the Housing Act 1988 as amended after the 1 October. The earliest date on which this notice can expire, and thus the earliest date on which you can seek possession is the 18 December 2010.

We wish to vacate the property on 18th November 2010. We are writing to inform you that once our tenancy converts to a statutory periodic tenancy we will serve our written notice on you to end the tenancy on the 18th November 2010.

We look forward to receiving your confirmation and the arrangement of our checkout in due course. We are willing to discuss suitable arrangements for you to access the property to conduct viewings in accordance with our tenancy agreement until the 01 October 2010 and at our convenience then after. [N79 Comment - it is very important that you respect any viewing clauses in your Common law tenancy until the 1st October as the breach of a viewing clause could lead to the LL sueing for possession on breach of contract.]

We remind you that we maintain at all times our legal protections from eviction by force under the Protection from Eviction act 1977 and we will not hesitate to enforce our rights if you choose to breach them.

Your sincerely

Imelda

=============================

It is then very important that you do service your written notice on your LL after the 1st October and before the 18th October.

Please Please Please also note that this is my personal interpretation of the legal changes that are happening. A court may well take a very different interpretation (although I doubt it). It is impossible to provide clarity because the way that the government has instituted the changes is very very messy as there are no transition arrangements in place and this sort of change has not been made retrospectively before.

I'm sure TBS (and others) will have her own opinion on the enforceability of Notice to Quits issued while the tenancy was a common law tenancy but expiring after the conversion to an AST.

Imelda

N79 wrote: »

Rubbish I'm afraid. This is a common law tenancy. 2 month provision only applies to ATs, ASTs and the Statutory Periodic tenancies that arise from them.

I did some digging about and it changes to £100k for ASTs on 1st October 2010.

Then all common law tenancies (that are common law due to the high rent rule) automatically become ASTs.

For common law tenancies the notice period (for either party) is 1mth if rent paid monthly, 4 weeks if paid weekly and must end at the end of a rental period.

Guess we have just been unlucky and incredibily naive. We genuinely wanted to "help" our LL and were prepared to give formal notice once we had a more certain date for completion- as it is we're just in the process of obtaining quotes for various issues that came up in the survey. So we are by no means far along with the purchase. In fact there was every possibility we would not go through with it.

Just proves my reasoning for buying, hell, we're buying this house regardless now:D

N79

Imelda wrote: »

I did some digging about and it changes to £100k for ASTs on 1st October 2010.

Then all common law tenancies (that are common law due to the high rent rule) automatically become ASTs.

For common law tenancies the notice period (for either party) is 1mth if rent paid monthly, 4 weeks if paid weekly and must end at the end of a rental period.

Guess we have just been unlucky and incredibily naive. We genuinely wanted to "help" our LL and were prepared to give formal notice once we had a more certain date for completion- as it is we're just in the process of obtaining quotes for various issues that came up in the survey. So we are by no means far along with the purchase. In fact there was every possibility we would not go through with it.

Just proves my reasoning for buying, hell, we're buying this house regardless now:D

See my big post. That is not how I interpret the effects of the changes. I can not see a legal argument for your notice to quit remaining enforceable after 01 Oct.