With the Government having announced the commencement date for the Renters’ Rights Act, this is the starting gun for all of us who provide services to landlords.
Landlord Law is no exception. We have a huge amount of content, so it is a huge job.
This work is essential to ensure that members can continue to rely on Landlord Law for accurate, practical guidance as the new rules come into force.
However, I am well on my way. The following have already been updated:
The Landlord Law checklists
There are five of these, each one for a different stage in the life of a tenancy:
- The Property Checklist – on getting your property ready to let and setting things up
- The New Tenant Checklist – guidance on finding new tenants
- The New Tenancy Checklist – what you need to do when setting up a new tenancy
- The Tenancy Management Checklist – on managing an ongoing tenancy, and finally
- The End of Tenancy & Renewals Checklist – what to do at the end of the tenancy
These checklists are really useful as they provide detailed guidance, as well as linking out to other pages on Landlord Law and to guidance documents on the internet.
They will be regularly updated and reviewed again before the commencement of the Act on 1 May.
The Top Tips
These are (fairly detailed) tips on various topics – all available to non members. They form a good checklist for the most important topics.
The Landlord Law Audit Kit
All landlords should carry out an audit of their property portfolio at least once a year.
Our audit kit will help you do this.
The Tenancy Trail
This is a free guide to help you work out your tenancy type.
There is now a new section for the post Renters Rights Act commencement.
The Which Tenancy Agreement Guide
Another free guide, this time on tenancy agreements and how to choose the correct one for your property.
Visit the Which Tenancy Agreement Guide
The Property Access Kit
This is a very large and detailed kit which used to be sold as a separate product.
It discusses in some detail all the situations where you will require access to your property and the relevant rules and regulations which apply.
There is then guidance on how to persuade reluctant tenants to allow you access. If this fails, there is a step-by-step guide on obtaining an injunction.
Before updating this, I had forgotten how detailed and helpful it is. A very useful kit for landlords to read, even if their tenants are not being problematic about access.
Tenancy Agreements
We can’t create Renters Rights Act compliant tenancy agreements yet as the government have not published the prescribed clauses which need to go in them.
However, I have created a pre Renters Rights Act tenancy for members to use. There is a standard AST version and one for a let of a room in a shared house.
The Landlord Law FAQ
We have a huge number of FAQ, and I am gradually going through them all and creating new versions to take effect once the new rules have come into effect on 1 May.
At that time, the old FAQ (which are still online, with a warning note on them) will all be deleted. The new FAQ are available to read, again with a warning notice, this time saying they will not come into force until 1 May when the Renters Rights Act comes into force.
Still to do
I still have to amend the rest of the FAQ, the Articles and other Kits, and review all our videos. Some of which will no longer apply and will need to be deleted.
I’ll also need to check over all the documents, the Rent Arrears Action Plan (already partially amended) and the eviction guide (although the government say they will be introducing a new digital system, so I may wait until we know more about this). There are a few other bits and pieces. We have a lot of content.
See all items updated so far here
Help for members
Given the scale of the changes, members are advised to check our Checklists first. If they have a question or problem about the new rules, I am always available to advise on our members’ forum.
We also have our monthly training webinars. The next one will be taken by me on 9 December and will be on preparing for the Renters Rights Act implementation.
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