• Home
  • About
  • Clinic
  • Training
  • Tenants
  • Landlord Law

The Landlord Law Blog

From landlord and tenant lawyer Tessa Shepperson

  • Home
  • Posts
  • News & comment
  • Cases
  • Tenants
    • The Renters Guide Website
    • 15 Places for tenant help
  • Clinic
  • Series
    • Analysis
    • should law and justice be free
    • HMO Basics
    • Tenancy Agreements 33 days
    • Airbnb
    • Grounds for Eviction
    • Tips

Regulations on repairs and eviction rights

August 1, 2018 by Tessa Shepperson

Foundations of landlord and tenant law – Part 11

I said last week that I was going to talk about the Rent Act this week. However, on reflection, before I look at the main statutory codes which govern tenancies today, I really need to take a quick look at two other pieces of legislation which are very important in tenancy law:

  • The landlords repairing obligations, and
  • The protection from eviction act

evicted tenantsThe protection from Eviction Act 1977

Perhaps I had better look at the Protection from Eviction Act first, as it came first. It was one of the big acts passed by the Labour administration at that time to improve tenants rights.

Under this act, it is a criminal offence AND a civil wrong (entitling the tenant to go to the civil courts for compensation) to evict any residential tenant other than via a court action for possession (or ‘due process’ as it is called by lawyers).

Which is why you can no longer physically ‘re-enter’ a property under the old forfeiture rules discussed last time.

It is also an offence for a landlord to do anything which will make the tenant move out whether or not that was the intention of the landlord. In order of severity, this includes things like

  • Taking out the doors, walls and windows
  • Cutting off the services such as gas and electricity
  • Refusing to do repair work, and
  • Going round and shouting at the tenant

This is not a complete list but it gives you an idea.

Pay up or elseIt is a defence if the landlord had reasonable grounds for doing whatever it was. So if there is a gas leak and the whole block is about to be blown sky high, it’s all right to switch the gas off. However, the fact that the tenant is in arrears of rent, for example, does not justify going around and shouting at the tenant every day demanding payment.

Or indeed to send daily text messages.

These things will also be a breach of the covenant of quiet enjoyment.  So if you are a tenant and want to sue for compensation in the civil courts, that will be the basis of your claim.

Excluded licenses and tenancies

The protection from Eviction Act applies across the board to all tenancies and licenses – but there are a few exceptions. The landlord will not need to get a court order if the occupier is one of a list of excluded tenants and occupiers set out in section 3A.

One of the most important of these is where the occupier lives in the landlords own home. This will normally be where someone takes in a lodger and shares living accommodation with them, but it will also apply if the occupier has a tenancy of his room, so long as living accommodation is shared with the landlord.

For the exception to apply however the landlord (or a member of his family) must have lived in the building as his only or principal home immediately before the license or tenancy is created and at the time it ends (although maybe not in between). The shared accommodation must be ‘proper’ accommodation such as a bathroom, kitchen and/or living room, not just a shared hallway and storage space.

I have written more about this on my Lodger Landlord website.Tessa's 21 tips for Lodger Landlords

Lodgers are not the only excluded categories, others include bona fide holiday lets and situations where squatters are allowed to stay “as a temporary expedient”.

The landlords statutory repairing obligations

These are set out in section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 and apply to all tenancies with a term of less than seven years. Under this section the landlord must keep in repair:

  • The structure and exterior of the property and
  • The installations for the supply of water, gas, electricity and sanitation and
  • For space and water heating.

These obligations are implied into ALL tenancies and cannot be excluded by any contract term (other than by a court order, which I have never heard of anyone actually obtaining).

So, for example, landlords need to be very careful about letting tenants into a property at a very low rent on the basis that they will carry out essential repair work.  Because once in, the tenants can turn round and say ‘I’m not doing it, mate”.

The agreement to do the repair work will be unenforceable (if it is work that comes within section 11) but the low rent will continue to apply.

There are a few exceptions

The rules say that landlords will not have to do the repairs:

  • Where the disrepair has been caused by the tenants failure to look after the property in a ‘tenant-like manner’
  • Where the item in question belongs to the tenant (or as the act puts it, it is something he is entitled to remove from the premises), and
  • A landlord does not have to rebuild or reinstate a property if it has been destroyed or damaged by “fire, or by tempest, flood or other inevitable accident”.

Finally, the landlord will not be liable for failing to do repairs for something he knows nothing about (we thought for a while that this rule had been changed in Edwards v. Kumarasamy but the Supreme Court reinstated it).

So before complaining about their terrible property to the authorities or bringing any claim for disrepair, tenants should tell the landlord about the problem and formally request that the repair work is done.

This needs to be done in writing (an ordinary letter will do) and make sure you keep a copy.

Next week, the Rent Act.

Eviction picture is Wikipedia commons 

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Filed Under: Foundations in Law

Scroll down for the comments

IMPORTANT: Please check the date of the post above - remember, if it is an old post, the law may have changed since it was written.

You should always get independent legal advice before taking any action.

Notes on comments:

For personal landlord and tenant related problems, please use our >> Blog Clinic.
Note that we do not publish all comments, please >> click here to read our terms of use and comments policy. Comments close after three months.

Keep up with the news on Landlord Law blog!

To get posts sent direct to your email in box click here

About Tessa Shepperson

Tessa is a specialist landlord & tenant solicitor and the creator of this site! She is a director of Landlord Law Services which now hosts Landlord Law and other services for landlords and property professionals.

« Accommodation models for criminal landlords
Ten Top Tips for Landlords on Evicting Tenants »

Comments

  1. Ben Reeve-Lewis says

    August 1, 2018 at 10:43 AM

    One thing I’ve always thought interesting is that s11 does not cover showers or bidets, unless it states it in the tenancy agreement

  2. Annette says

    August 3, 2018 at 11:55 AM

    I suggest all Landlords read this post very carefully, I did the very thing talked about here and it has come back to well & truly bit my bum. But worse than that, I agreed to low rent as they could not afford higher on the condition that keep the day to day maintenance up to date, they also said that they were staying up to two years and no more. This suited me as I was already reaerating 2 more houses, and I expected this house to need work after two years. Here we are four years later, they have made the house unliveable, not only not kept the maintenance up have caused damp & condensation , have moved extra people in including a baby without permission. I cannot get rid of them, gave them a section 21 they have gone to the council housing and told them a load of baloney, and will not give them a house until they are evicted by bailiffs They have also gone to the council and are pleading retaliatory eviction, although that was after the section 21 was sent. The Council has been told that the work cannot happen with the family still living in there because of Health & safety, the council says the work has to be done in the next six weeks. Their suggest then was to put the family in another of my properties, which I have not got any one large enough even if one was empty, so I am meant to pay to have them rehoused while the work is being done. The council have given me a list of jobs that I have got to do within the next two months. Solve the overcrowding, I did not agree to the people being there and my manager got in trouble with the police for daring to ask for the overdue rent, and asking the people not on the tenancy to leave. he has been accused of harassment, but he had several witnesses saying different to the Tenants. The Council say the house is too cold, I put in a new boiler a couple of years ago, I offered radiators upstairs this was refused in most rooms as they would not be able to fit the furniture in. Downstairs they had a open fire which they wanted to keep as it was free heating, I blocked it off earlier this year due to them not getting he chimney swept and it was being left while alight causing a fire risk. Sorry this turned into a rant.

Index of posts

  • Introduction
  • 1-Land Law, a bit of history, and the two estates in land
  • 2-Owning Property with other people – the rules
  • 3-Where does law come from and where does it get its authority?
  • 4-A digression on equity and the Court of Chancery
  • 5-Its all in the contract
  • 6-Tenancies and how land law and contract work together
  • 7-The six most important elements of a tenancy or lease
  • 8-Common law and statute
  • 9-Differentiating tenancies from business lets and long leases
  • 10-The basic law of tenancies before the codes
  • 11-Regulations on repair and eviction rights
  • 12-The Rent Act 1977 in context
  • 13-Explaining the Housing Act 1988
  • 14-The Social Rented Sector
  • 15-Regulations in Housing Law
  • 16-Summing it all up

The History of Law Blog

Free e courseThis is the blog I was inspired to write after the first Foundations Series.

Posts go up to the end of Henry II’s reign.

>> Click here

Disclaimer

The purpose of this blog is to provide information, comment and discussion.

Although Tessa, or guest bloggers, may from time to time, give helpful comments to readers' questions, these can only be based on the information given by the reader in his or her comment, which may not contain all material facts.

Any comments or suggestions provided by Tessa or any guest bloggers should not, therefore be relied upon as a substitute for legal advice from a qualified lawyer regarding any actual legal issue or dispute.

Nothing on this website should be construed as legal advice or perceived as creating a lawyer-client relationship (apart from the Fast Track block clinic service - so far as the questioners only are concerned).

Please also note that any opinion expressed by a guest blogger is his or hers alone, and does not necessarily reflect the views of Tessa Shepperson, or the other writers on this blog.

Cookies

You can find out more about our use of 'cookies' on this website here.

Associated sites

Landlord Law Services
The Renters Guide
Eco Landlords
Your Law Store

Legal

Landlord Law Blog is © 2006 – 2021 Tessa Shepperson.

Note that Tessa is an introducer for Alan Boswell Insurance Brokers and will get a commission from sales made via links on this website.

© 2006–2022 Tessa Shepperson | Rainmaker Platform | Contact Page | Privacy | Log in

This website or its third-party tools use cookies which are necessary to its functioning and required to improve your experience. By clicking the consent button, you agree to allow the site to use, collect and/or store cookies.
I accept