We’d like to remind Forumites to please avoid political debate on the Forum.

This is to keep it a safe and useful space for MoneySaving discussions. Threads that are – or become – political in nature may be removed in line with the Forum’s rules. Thank you for your understanding.

PLEASE READ BEFORE POSTING: Hello Forumites! In order to help keep the Forum a useful, safe and friendly place for our users, discussions around non-MoneySaving matters are not permitted per the Forum rules. While we understand that mentioning house prices may sometimes be relevant to a user's specific MoneySaving situation, we ask that you please avoid veering into broad, general debates about the market, the economy and politics, as these can unfortunately lead to abusive or hateful behaviour. Threads that are found to have derailed into wider discussions may be removed. Users who repeatedly disregard this may have their Forum account banned. Please also avoid posting personally identifiable information, including links to your own online property listing which may reveal your address. Thank you for your understanding.
📨 Have you signed up to the Forum's new Email Digest yet? Get a selection of trending threads sent straight to your inbox daily, weekly or monthly!

Rescind tenancy notice

Currently a private tenant in a UK property managed via an estate agent. We're working through a house purchase at the moment so trying to juggle handling in our rental notice. I've just been told by my estate agent that I can give my 30 days notice but then I can rescind that anytime before those 30 days are over. Regardless of if it's been re-marketed and even if another individual has said they'll sign the property. They'd just be told they can no longer move in.

This seems too good to be true as there's not much for me to lose by handing in the notice, if anything falls through we can just rescind the notice. I've checked with two different people at the estate agents and both have given the same advice. I can legally rescind the notice, and 100% stay in the property. Not up to the landlord at all, although they could issue a 2 month notice to move out if they weren't happy with it.

I really hope it doesn't come to that and everything should go through fine but if we don't give notice at the right time we'll be over £1k worse off so trying to avoid that too! Is this true?
«13

Comments

  • Burg9
    Burg9 Posts: 17 Forumite
    Third Anniversary 10 Posts
    Just to add this has been confirmed by both my current estate agent and the sellers agent so seems true. Was just wondering if anyone had had any experience in this.
  • AdrianC
    AdrianC Posts: 42,189 Forumite
    Eighth Anniversary 10,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Wouldn't it just be easier to have a friendly chat with the landlord, and say "Look, this is the score, I'll keep you posted."...?
  • theartfullodger
    theartfullodger Posts: 15,770 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper
    edited 2 July 2020 at 1:47PM
    AdrianC said:
    Wouldn't it just be easier to have a friendly chat with the landlord, and say "Look, this is the score, I'll keep you posted."...?

    Indeed: Issue is, formally (ie in law..) once a tenant has served valid notice to quit but does not leave, landlord has the right to demand double rent.  Not a risk worth running.
    Agent is either ignorant of the law (not good..) or a liar (worse..)
    Artful: Landlord since 2000
  • Burg9
    Burg9 Posts: 17 Forumite
    Third Anniversary 10 Posts
    Ah I wish it was that easy to speak to the landlord. Sadly it's all via the estate agent and they're not really one for informal chats between tenant and landlord. 

    Perhaps this is something specific to the agent then? I've checked with several there and they've all said the same thing. Including another completely different estate agent :O It's not per say "refusal to leave" but more of a rescinding of the notice. If there's much difference between those. 
  • Comms69
    Comms69 Posts: 14,229 Forumite
    10,000 Posts Third Anniversary Name Dropper
    edited 2 July 2020 at 2:01PM
    Burg9 said:
    Currently a private tenant in a UK property managed via an estate agent. We're working through a house purchase at the moment so trying to juggle handling in our rental notice. I've just been told by my estate agent that I can give my 30 days notice but then I can rescind that anytime before those 30 days are over. Regardless of if it's been re-marketed and even if another individual has said they'll sign the property. They'd just be told they can no longer move in.

    This seems too good to be true as there's not much for me to lose by handing in the notice, if anything falls through we can just rescind the notice. I've checked with two different people at the estate agents and both have given the same advice. I can legally rescind the notice, and 100% stay in the property. Not up to the landlord at all, although they could issue a 2 month notice to move out if they weren't happy with it.

    I really hope it doesn't come to that and everything should go through fine but if we don't give notice at the right time we'll be over £1k worse off so trying to avoid that too! Is this true?
    Legally you cannot rescind a notice. So any such agreement would be purely voluntary. 

    and 100% at the discretion of the landlord. the agent is nothing to do with you at all. 
  • Burg9
    Burg9 Posts: 17 Forumite
    Third Anniversary 10 Posts
    Yeah that's what I've found online so was surprised to hear that from the agents... Perhaps since the agent handles this side of things for the landlord they just deal with it without it needing it all to go via the landlord? End of the day the landlord is still getting the rent and payments either way? It would be much easier being able to have a amicable discussion with the landlord directly...
  • Comms69
    Comms69 Posts: 14,229 Forumite
    10,000 Posts Third Anniversary Name Dropper
    Burg9 said:
    Yeah that's what I've found online so was surprised to hear that from the agents... Perhaps since the agent handles this side of things for the landlord they just deal with it without it needing it all to go via the landlord? End of the day the landlord is still getting the rent and payments either way? It would be much easier being able to have a amicable discussion with the landlord directly...
    Or the agents are dodgy and dont tell the landlord anything at all. I dont know. 

    The legal position is how i posted, sorry. 
  • princeofpounds
    princeofpounds Posts: 10,396 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    Most agents only have a tenuous grasp of letting law. As others have said, it would be quite a risk to issue notice without being confident of departure. 

    Normal advice would be to only issue notice once you have exchanged. If there is a gap between exchange and completion then you won't even be overlapping by a full month. Use the time to have a stress-free move.

    By the way, it's unlikely your required notice period is actually 30 days. It is probably one month to coincide with a defined rental period. But if the LA/LL is happy to accept surrender of the tenancy on that basis then it's not a problem in practice.
  • Slithery
    Slithery Posts: 6,046 Forumite
    Eighth Anniversary 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    Sounds like a load of bol⁣locks to me, but if the agent insists that it's possible then make sure you get this in writing.
    Burg9 said:
    It would be much easier being able to have a amicable discussion with the landlord directly...
    Then do so. If you ask for a copy of the landlords actual address in writing from the agent then they are legally obliged to give it to you.

  • Burg9
    Burg9 Posts: 17 Forumite
    Third Anniversary 10 Posts
    I'm guessing the landlord will generally go off the advice of the letting agent if they're using them though.

    The sellers have put in a rather hopeful completion date of 24th July, I don't think we'll quite make that but I'm not expecting it to be much longer if nothing ends up falling through. Our tenancy runs from the 4th of each month. So if I find out in the next week or two that it is in fact going to be 24th and I've not given notice it means I'll be paying the current rent up to 4th September is the problem - quite a bit of wasted £££. There's not likely to be very long between exchange and completion - likely days. 

    If it was just 30 days from whenever that would be great but the need to align with the contract date really does us over here. This obviously isn't a problem if we're able to rescind as we'll know much more in the next week or two on the completion date, if it's much further we can just rescind and it's fine, otherwise if it's only a week or so over we can elsewhere in the interim. Or so I thought....
Meet your Ambassadors

🚀 Getting Started

Hi new member!

Our Getting Started Guide will help you get the most out of the Forum

Categories

  • All Categories
  • 352K Banking & Borrowing
  • 253.5K Reduce Debt & Boost Income
  • 454.2K Spending & Discounts
  • 245.1K Work, Benefits & Business
  • 600.7K Mortgages, Homes & Bills
  • 177.4K Life & Family
  • 258.8K Travel & Transport
  • 1.5M Hobbies & Leisure
  • 16.2K Discuss & Feedback
  • 37.6K Read-Only Boards

Is this how you want to be seen?

We see you are using a default avatar. It takes only a few seconds to pick a picture.