The Renters Rights Bill – what do we do about existing tenancies?

I have had quite a few anxious questions from Landlord Law members and others about what will need to be done about existing tenancies when the Renters Rights Act comes into force.

The relevant part of the act for tenancies will come into force on 1 May 2026. 

This is what will happen regarding existing tenancies:

• All assured periodic and assured shorthold tenancies will immediately convert to assured periodic tenancies on 1 May
• Landlords will be required to serve an information notice, which will be a prescribed form, on all of these tenancies before 31 May 2026
• Student landlords will be given a period of one month to serve notice on student tenants if you want to reserve the right to use the new ground 4A – the new eviction ground for landlords of student HMO properties.
• There will be no need to serve any other documents (such as new tenancy agreements) on your tenants.

It will be an offence under the Act not to service the information form, for which you can be fined up to £7,000.  So when you serve it, make sure you keep proof of this.

At the time of writing, the information form has not yet been published by the Government.  We have been told it is likely to be published sometime in March.

Note that if the tenancy is not currently an assured or an assured shorthold tenancy, you do not need to worry about all this as the Act does not apply.  It only applies (in this respect) to tenancies regulated by the Housing Act 1988, ie assured and assured shorthold tenancies.

New rules about new tenancies started after 1 May 2026

There will be new rules about tenancy agreements;

• Landlords will be required to provide tenants with a ‘statement of terms’ (ie a tenancy agreement) before the tenancy is ‘entered into’ (effectively before it is signed).
• Landlords can be fined up to £7,000 if they don’t do this
• There will be ‘prescribed clauses’ which will have to go in all tenancy agreements

The prescribed clauses will be set out in regulations, and, again, we have not seen them yet.

There are, though are a few things we know about tenancy agreements under the act:

• They must not give a fixed term – as all tenancies will be periodic.  So no end date – just the starting date of the tenancy and the period (which will normally be monthly)
• Any clauses purporting to increase the rent will be of no effect
• Also, any clauses which purport to tell tenants what they must say or do as regards tenants ‘notice to quit’ will be of no effect
• They must provide information about the possession proceedings which will apply to the tenancy

I will be doing new tenancy agreements for Landlord Law members in due course, but I can’t do this until after the government have published the regulations setting out the new prescribed clauses.

I will be publishing a new post here once I have been able to draft up the new tenancy ageeements for use after 1 May. 

In the meantime, I have prepared a pre Renters Rights Act tenancy agreement for Landlord Law members to use.

For more guidance, Members should watch the various training webinar recordings listed here.