Assured Tenancies and Possession S.21 Notice update following COVID19 Provisions
How much notice must you give a tenant when using S.21 to regain possession ? If you have given a notice to the tenant between 26th March 2020 and 23rd July 2020 the landlord must give the tenant 3 Months notice. If notice has been given between 24th July and 28th September 2020 the tenant must be given 6 months. From the 26th September 2020 assured tenants must be given 6 months notice.
Where a tenant remains in occupation of a house at the end of a fixed term he or she will usually do so as a statutory periodic tenant pursuant to S.5 (2) of the Housing Act 1988.
The landlord will usually be able to regain possession from such a tenant by a notice under section 21 of the 1988 Act. The landlord must have complied with Assured Shorthold Tenancy Notices and Prescribed Requirements (England) Regulations 2015 if the property is located in England or the Housing (Wales) Act 2014 if the property is located in Wales.
If their is non compliance with the relevant aforementioned act the landlord might not be able to serve a valid section 21 notice on the tenantS.21 Notices given before 25th March 2020 must give not less than 2 months notice that the landlord requires possession. Paragraph 7 of Schedule 29 to the Coronavirus Act 2020 extended this period to three months for notices given after 25 March 2020. The changes made by the Regulations are twofold:
Pursuant to Section 3(7)(a) of the Regulations, the notice period for s.21 notices given on or after 29 August 2020 is now six months.
Further, Section 3(7)(b) restores the four-month window in which landlords can bring possession proceedings following the notice period. Proceedings may be issued up to ten months from the date of service of the notice, rather than the six months previously in place.
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