Here is a question to the blog clinic from Janet who is a tenant
My landlord has recently married. Her new husband says that he is now my joint landlord. Is this correct and what can I do to stop it
Answer
Your landlord’s husband may not be a legal owner of the property but he will certainly have an interest in it by virtue of his marriage. Although it is entirely possible that the wife has put the property into both names.
There is nothing you can do to prevent this – as there is nothing you can do to prevent a landlord from selling a property to a new landlord, or indeed dying so the property passes to another landlord under her will or intestacy.
As a tenant, you have no control over who owns the property. Your rights remain the same, whoever owns it, so under law, it should not matter who your landlord is.
Note also that the wife is quite entitled to ask her husband to manage the property as her agent, and you cannot prevent this either. It is up to the landlord to choose the agent, not the tenant.
There are only limited circumstances where anyone can have any control over who manages a property:
- If the property is a licensed HMO and the landlord or property manager is plainly unsuitable the tenant can complain to the Local Authority who may amend the terms of the license to require another manager (unlikely in practice but possible)
- If the property is in Wales, the property can only be managed by a licensed landlord or letting agent
Apart from that, it is up to the landlord.
Surely, the landlord is whoever is named as Landlord on the tenancy agreement or, if there’s no tenancy agreement, whoever receives the rent.
There are formal notices required to notify a tenant of a change of landlord, and, until they’re served, the landlord hasn’t changed.
When they are, there’s nothing the tenant can do about it.