End of student tenancies as we know them?

Reply to the comment left by DPT at 23/05/2025 – 11:19
And the established law in England is that notices can be served by any one individual in a joint tenancy; so there is no basis in law for taking a different stance when it comes to a notice from the Tenant requesting withdrawal of an NTQ.

Reply to the comment left by Nick M at 19/05/2025 – 17:01
Whoever drafts most legislation has no idea about what the legislation intends or the repercussions of badly drafted legislation.

Hence the duty on the judiciary to interpret legislation and make case law and precedents.

Reply to the comment left by Grumpy Doug at 19/05/2025 – 22:31
Ahh but you cannot give a bad reference as can be Discriminatory; against their Human Rights lol

Need a universal veiled “don’t touch with a barge pole” phrase lol

Reply to the comment left by Simon F at 23/05/2025 – 16:14
Simon, you may wish that to be so, but fortunately or unfortunately, it’s not.

Contributors to this thread are being very hard on HMO tenants who wish to leave a joint tenancy early. They needn’t be horrible people. Many find university isn’t for them, or have mental health breakdowns or fall ill, or having caring responsibilities that become overwhelming, making it impossible for them to continue with their course. Similarly there are sometimes irreconcilable clashes of personalities.
As someone who rents HMOs to working people, I find the concept of student tenancies weird. Students should be liable for council tax like everyone else, just as part-time or day-release students have always been liable. And why should students be entitled to the luxury of tenancies that fit nicely with their term times, just because it suits them? It’s just feather-bedding them.
As for renting to groups and one of them leaves, why can’t landlords use a licence and require the group to set themselves up as a business partnership or limited company, or have a clause in the contract that says they are a Tenant (single entity) so are jointly responsible for covering the full property’s agreed rent. If one of them abandons ship, the rest have to cover their rent; they can also find a replacement tenant, vetted by the landlord, and if the only person they can find is a non-student, they will be jointly responsible for paying their share of the council tax (less 25% single person discount). If they are concerned about this financial risk, well they can take out insurance.

Reply to the comment left by AnthonyJames at 25/05/2025 – 23:08
Anthony, I read your post a couple of times before my response … for clarity I’m a student landlord of over 15 years. Being blunt, student tenancies at the moment work. Nothing weird about an academic year at all – it occurs right across all universities in the land so it’s wonderfully predictable for both landlords and students – September through to July with August available to sort the houses out. They get a hard life!
Re the contract, they are all on a single AST so if one decides to leave, they are still liable for their share of the rent. Oh, and there’s ALWAYS a guarantor in the background to ensure the above. No guarantor, no tenancy. In practise, they will often find a suitable replacement.
This all works, always has done and always will do provided the damned govt keep away. However the RRB will screw it all up, hence the comments to date. We’re not being horrible. This is our world and we actually know it quite well.

My whole point when writing this post was to highlight the position tenants would be in if one of their number served notice to quit thus ending the whole tenancy. This would leave the remaining tenants at the mercy of the landlord if she/he actually found it convenient to take the house back. They would then struggle as a group to find alternative housing. Simon states that under clause 22 of the bill the notice can be withdrawn if the “tenant and landlord” agree in writing. He implies that this would cancel a NTQ served by one individual from the group. This could chaotic situations with the original tenant reserving a NTQ. Do people on this thread generally agree the notice can be withdrawn by the other tenants and the landlord agreeing to its withdrawal and would it, as Simon suggests, need a clause in the original tenancy to say the view of the majority take precedence over the wishes of the minority?

Reply to the comment left by Joanna Fear at 26/05/2025 – 07:36
No

Reply to the comment left by DPT at 20/05/2025 – 09:56
I’m afraid that isn’t how joint periodic tenancies work. The fiction is that the tenancy for a month, week, or year is renewed automatically unless *anyone* in the relationship of L and T indicates that they don’t want that to happen. That wish is communicated by a notice to quit. So one part of a joint tenant absolutely can give a valid, unilateral, notice to quit to the landlord.

Reply to the comment left by Joanna Fear at 26/05/2025 – 07:36From my understand, all the RRB allows is a withdrawal of a NTQ, where both tenant and landlord agrees. Currently it is not legally possible, but Something which I imagine, happens informally today if needed anyway.
The topic has brought up the issue of joint tenancies which are common with students. If one tenant puts in a NTQ, like they can do today. Does it mean any tenant can withdraw it, or does it need to be the same tenant, or all tenants.
There are pros and cons to both sides, you either trap a tenant in a tenancy like Scotland, or you allow it to end like today, then the tenants need to arrange a new tenancy with the same or different landlord.
I feel like everyone is making a big thing out of this, when it is just there to allow the withdrawal of an accidental NTQ, rather than change the status quo of how to terminate a tenancy.