ROOF Blog

The Government has informed the National Landlords Association (NLA) that the Assured shorthold tenancy (AST) threshold will rise to £100,000 on October 1 2010. The proposal to increase the threshold had been broadly welcomed by the NLA as an attempt to offer greater clarity and transparency for landlords and tenants. But it seems that a quirk of the process means the change will be retrospective and will be applied to existing tenancies. As a result, any tenancy with an annual rent between £25,000 and £100,000 in existence on 1 October 2023 will become an AST overnight. The NLA says the proposals have the potential to be damaging to a significant number of landlords who entered into contractual tenancy agreements in good faith. Landlords and tenants will no longer be able to negotiate individual terms for their tenancy and the rights and responsibilities associated with the Housing Act 1988 will be extended to these higher rent properties.

One million homes are expected to be empty in the UK this year, despite 1.8 million Britons being on the waiting list for social housing. In 2008, there were more empty properties in the north-west of England than anywhere else in the country, with 129,073 houses lying vacant, says the charity the Empty Homes Agency. It is not illegal to leave a property empty, but the government has various ways to discourage it. Where the owner ignores calls to put the property to use, a local authority can make a compulsory purchase order under Housing Act powers. This means it will buy the property at the market rate and sell it on again or convert it into social housing. At the same time, however, the law encourages the practice of leaving properties empty by offering a council tax exemption on any dwellings that are vacant for up to six months.