Just been served a Section 21 - should we acknowledge?

VickyA_2

Many thanks to those people who replied to my previous thread about deposits etc.

The new owners of our rented house have (yesterday) served us with a Section 21 Notice to Quit (or whatever the term is!) the property by 26th August "at the latest". Firstly, do we have to acknowledge receipt of this?

Secondly, should we find another property that we could move into, can we serve a 1 month "counter notice" on the new owners - ie ensuring that we don't have to pay rent up to the 26th August, if at all possible, on this current property.

We have booked a holiday for 3rd August - 18th August, so ideally we'd move before then.... just so long as we didn't have to pay rent on two places for too long! And that all depends on finding another place to rent THIS WEEK so that we could issue (if you say we can!) our counter notice.

Plus, is there a "Section" that we could quote if we did serve a counter notice?

Thanks once again.
Vicky

Guy_Montag

you can give your notice 1 month in advance to end on the rent day. If you are past June's rent day you need to do it by July's. My guess is your rent day is on the 26th so you need to get your notice in tomorrow.

This must be in writing, so hand deliver if possible, if not special delivery & fax &/or e-mail.

dwhl

Hi vicky,

from my very basic knowledge of the housing act '88, i think that the landlord has to deliver the notice by recorded delivery and specify each individual tenant and give you two months notice at least. I don't think that they have to give a reason for wanting to regain possession of the property.

I'm not sure whether you have to acknowledge receipt of the notice but if you're going on holiday am sure that they would be flexible if you asked them.

don't think that you can serve a "counter notice" on another tenant in another property unless you are the landlord of that property...

hope that helps

david

VickyA_2

Thank you Guy and David.

Our rent day is 1st of each month (or it was under our agreement with the previous landlord/letting agent).

The landlord did indeed deliver the notice by recorded delivery and served it on both me and my husband (we are joint tenants).

furby-2003

we did just that in our last property.

After 3 years we were given 2 months to leave out of the blue. So we quickly found another place and handed in 1 month as we were on a month by month rolling contract.

To be honest there is nothing they can do because you are well within your rights.

In fact we are just about to do it with this house. They asked for 2 months but we can give 1. So we nicely pointed out that it would be pointless to have it empty for 6 weeks and it would be better to give 1 month. And they put it back on the market pretty sharpish so were ok with that.

Its best to make it sound like your doing them a favour rather than i'll see your 2 months and raise you 1 month :-)

dwhl

good luck with your future move.....and have a great holiday

Guy_Montag

VickyA wrote: »

Thank you Guy and David.

Our rent day is 1st of each month (or it was under our agreement with the previous landlord/letting agent).

The landlord did indeed deliver the notice by recorded delivery and served it on both me and my husband (we are joint tenants).

Then give your notice by the first of July that you will be moving out by the first of August. As others have suggested make it clear you are doing them a favour.

Meatballs

I'm pretty sure the Section 21 legally should say the 1st if that is when the rent is due. (Or after 31st July)
If they are asking for you out on the 25th August would they be going to give you 6 days rent back (that you had already paid on 1st August?).

You can give 1 months notice as long as you are out of the fixed term of your AST (6/12 months etc).

silvercar

If your rent day is the first of each month, why are they giving notice to quit by the 26th of August and not the 1st September?

Your obligation to give one month's notice (ending on a rent day) applies if you are on a periodic tennacy, if you are on the original 12 month AST and it ends 1st September then you cannot give notice to leave on 1st August.

If you rush and give notice to leave on 1st August, what will you do if you cannot find a new place to rent so quickly?

franklee

VickyA, Are you on a periodic tenancy? In other words has your fixed term finished and no new contract signed?

You pay rent on the 1st of each month, is that also the day of the month when the tenancy started? Or did the tenancy start on the 27th?

If you are on a periodic tenancy and the tenancy started on the 27th of the month then your landlord should have dated the Section 21 notice to expire after 26th August. If your tenancy started on the 1st of the month then the S21 notice you have been served is invalid.

You do not have to acknowledge receipt of the S21. If the notice is invalid do not tell them yet in case you need more time.

If you are on a periodic tenancy then I think you are free to leave once you have been served the S21, but I suspect you will have to argue for this as the agent/LL won't like it.

http://www.landlordzone.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=251

paul_f's answers are worth reading:

http://www.landlordzone.co.uk/forums/showpost.php?p=1263&postcount=3
http://www.landlordzone.co.uk/forums/showpost.php?p=1311&postcount=16
http://www.landlordzone.co.uk/forums/showpost.php?p=1353&postcount=23

If you want to serve your own notice you can do so.

VickyA_2

Thanks for the replies.

In answer to your questions:

We are on a periodic tenancy and have been for some time (10 months).

Our tenancy started on 26th September 2005, but our rent is payable on the first of each month. We sent our first rent cheque off last night to the new landlord/owner, pointing out that our rent day is the first of each month.

We're not going to give a counter notice if we can't find anywhere immediately! Gosh, that would send my stress levels sky high. I'm going to see one property tonight and two tomorrow. There is very little around that is suitable, but as we're hoping to buy in the Autumn, then it would only (hopefully) be a short term 6 month let anyway..........

franklee - thanks for the useful links!

Vicky