If you are a landlord who has let out a property on an assured shorthold tenancy and wish to re-claim possession of the property, you can do so by serving the tenant with a Section 21 Notice. A tenancy agreement can only be terminated with this type of notice once the fixed period of the tenancy has finished. The only real requirement is that the landlord must have placed the tenants deposit into an approved protection scheme and the tenant must be given at least 2 months of notice.
If you would like to get a tenancy eviction order granted because the tenant has breached the contract, a Section 21 Notice is not the right way forward. You should instead choose a Section 8 Notice. If you can prove the grounds upon which you are pursuing the eviction, not only will you get a tenancy eviction order, but you will also be able to recover legal costs from the tenant too.
When serving either of these notices, sometimes the tenant will simply move out as they don’t want the hassle of going to court, or they will resolve the problem that you have highlighted. However, you need to be aware that the tenant has a number of legal rights thanks to the UK Housing Act and they are entitled to exercise them.
Tenancy Eviction – Problems That Could Affect the Outcome
A tenant could use their rights to make it harder for the landlord to re-possess the property, particularly if any of the following occur.
- If the landlord has filed a Section 8 Notice, and doesn’t have sufficient evidence to prove the ground(s) upon which it was made.
- The court are not convinced the circumstances merit an eviction (Grounds 9-17 of Section 8 of the Housing Act are at the discretion of the court).
- Errors were made in one or several pieces of the paperwork that was filed. This could be a fault with the tenancy eviction notice that was served. Perhaps it wasn’t produced in the correct format, or a date or name was incorrect. In some cases, even if a slight error was made on behalf of the landlord, the possession order may still be granted.
- The correct period of notice was not given.
- No tenancy eviction notice was served to the tenant. The court may sometimes do this on the landlords behalf if the landlord failed to do it, but that certainly isn’t normal protocol and would result in the tenant being able to strongly contest the ruling.
- If the landlord failed to mention that he actually has a debt owed to the tenant, it may be impossible to recover rental arrears because of this. However, this doesn’t mean to say that the
court would not grant a possession order.
Tenancy Eviction – Possible Outcomes
If any of these factors come into play, it is possible that the whole process would be slowed down and that the tenant would be provided with another chance to make a counterclaim. Alternatively, it’s possible that re-possession of the property would be suspended indefinitely, unless the tenant breaches the agreement again.
