Periodic (month by month) tenancy contract, saying we have to give 2 months notice?

bee101

Hi,

Here is the situation. Partner and I are in the process of buying a house. No completion date as yet. Moved into our rented property in July 2009 on initially a 12 month contract. Renewed following that on a 6 month contract. Following this, landlords said it would be a month by month agreement (unless we wanted another fixed term contract) with both us and the landlords having to give 2 months notice in order to terminate the agreement. At that time we didn't think too much about it and were happy to do month by month. However, now we have received a letter from the landlords saying they are putting up the rent as of the 1st August and reminded us that if we want to leave we have to give them 2 months notice. Obviously with the completion of the property we are buying impending, we really don't want to pay 2 month's rent as notice as well as the mortgage on the property we're buying (that works out at £2000!). I have been talking to some friends who state that even on a periodic contract that the landlords have said we have to give 2 months notice for we actually only need to give one (they still need to give us 2) and that under tenancy law they cannot force us to give two months notice.

Is this true?

theartfullodger

In England you only need give 1 month expiring on rental-period date.

In Scotland, if tenancy says 2 (or 3, or 6..) months then you need to give 2 (or 3, or 6..)months notice..

How odd to find a LL not seeming to know what the law is...

tbs624

Assuming propertyin Eng/Wales)

Couple of issues here.

(a) You are on a stat periodic tenancy - you have to give one month's notice, the LL has to give two. Has to line up with the correct dates. Your tenancy period runs from the day after your original FT expired. So if FT expiry is 12th of month, for example, then subsequent tenancy periods would run from 13th of one month to 12th of next ( that is so even if the rent due date is not the 13th). You would need to ensure that LL recive your one month notice by 13th or risk being charged a further month's rent. LL & T can of course *agree* a partial month's let but most LLs prefer not to.

(b) If LL wishes to raise the rent has to do so by issuing a "S13 Notice" ( of the Housing Act 1988). When exactly did you receive that notification of rent increase and what form did it take?

bee101

Yes house in England. We have not received an S13 notice, just a standard letter through the post yesterday saying that as of the 1st Aug they are putting the rent up. It is not by much but it is still an increase. I understand what you are saying about the dates tbs624, but it is correct to say that we only need to give 1 months notice not 2? Im so relieved if that is the case.

tbs624

bee101 wrote: »

Yes house in England. We have not received an S13 notice, just a standard letter through the post yesterday saying that as of the 1st Aug they are putting the rent up. It is not by much but it is still an increase. I understand what you are saying about the dates tbs624, but it is correct to say that we only need to give 1 months notice not 2? Im so relieved if that is the case.

Yes - *one* month to line up with those "tenancy/rental period" dates.

You can ignore the rent increase letter - they need to serve that S13. Even if you had received a formal S13 yesterday( rather than a letter) then the rise would not be able to be applied until 1st Sept. T's can challenge S13 rent increases btw via a local Rent Assessment Committee and such an application would need to be made before the increase would otherwise become due.

FireWyrm

What's an S13? Our landlord gave us a new contract with the rent increase on it. I assumed this was sufficient and despite being annoyed, had no choice or move out we were told.

tbs624

FireWyrm wrote: »

What's an S13? Our landlord gave us a new contract with the rent increase on it. I assumed this was sufficient and despite being annoyed, had no choice or move out we were told.

It's for use with a statutory periodic tenancy, which has arisen when the original FT agreement has expired and no new Fixed Term tenancy agreement has been put in place.

Were you still within your original Fixed Term tenancy and/or did your AST agreement have any rent increase mechanism within it? Did you sign the new contract to run on immediately from the expiry of the original ?

bee101

I emailed our landlord this morning to clarify their position in asking us for 2 months notice and this is the reply I received:

The notice period in the contract is in fact 2 months for both parties after the fixed term ends. You are in fact, partly correct with regard to the one months notice but this only applies to statutory periodic tenancies and not contractual periodic tenancies. This means that where a tenancy does not end at the end of the fixed term and provision is made within it for the period after the fixed term the notice period is that designated within the contract. With regard to landlords notice this is a minimum of two months but is in fact linked to the rent paid period (So if you pay six months rent up front the landlords notice to the tenant is six months) and must end at the end of a rent period.

I hope the above clarifies the contract you are currently party to.

However, I have been looking through our original contract and can find no mention of this provision whatsoever.

franklee

It's possible you have a contractual periodic tenancy you'd need to look at the tenancy agreement. You could type up and post any clauses to do with the tenancy ending/continuing if you want. If they think it's there and you can't find it ask them to point out the relevant bits.

bee101

Yes the section is there. I emailed the landlord back earlier and he pointed out which section it is (I totally over looked that section). It clearly states that should the tenancy not be determined by the end of the fixed term contract it shall continue thereafter from month to month until either party gives the other no less than 2 months notice. However there is a sentence following this saying that if the tenant requests and the landlord agrees to prematurely release the tenant from his contractual obligations under this agreement the tenant agrees to pay the landlord a fee of £100. So hopefully if we explain our situation to the landlord he may take pity on us and agree to 1 months notice instead of 2. As £100 penalty fee is better than paying another months rent. We have been very good tenants, always paid our rent on time, kept ourselves to ourselves etc so I'm hoping he will understand that we are going to struggle financially if we have to give 2 months notice and release us from our agreement (bet he doesn't though . )

gauly

I would still just give one month's notice and then let the deposit scheme decide who is right. It seems an unfair contract which doubles your notice period, but doesn't change that of the landlord. At worst you will lose and have to pay the month's rent from the deposit (I think).