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On 27 October 2025, the long-awaited Renters' Rights Bill (the Act) received Royal Assent and became law. Below we will outline key changes brought about by the Act and how these will affect the private rental sector. It should be borne in mind that secondary legislation will not only supplement the Act but it will also provide a commencement date – currently anticipated to be March or April 2026 – as the vast majority of the provisions are not yet in force.
1. Abolishment of section 21 notices and changes to section 8 notice grounds
Landlords will no longer be able to serve section 21 notices, often referred to as the 'no-fault' eviction notices. Before the Act, landlords were able to serve this notice (provided that various requirements have been complied with) which carried a 2 months' notice period.
The Act has instead made changes to grounds for serving section 8 notices, which are most commonly used if there are rent arrears. Currently, landlords are able to serve a section 8 notice if the tenant owes at least 2 months' rent, or, if the rent is payable weekly, at least 8 week's rent. This threshold will be increased to 3 months and 13 weeks, respectively, while the notice period will be increased from 2 weeks to 4 weeks. Landlords will also be able to obtain possession of their property in cases of anti-social behaviour, if they are looking to sell the property or if they or their family members intend to move in, to name but a few possible grounds for service of section 8 notice.
2. Abolishment of fixed term tenancies
The Act will no longer allow fixed term assured shorthold tenancies. Rather, any new tenancy will be a periodic assured tenancy from day one, meaning that they will not have a set end date. In practice, this means that the tenants will not be bound by any minimum letting period and tenants will generally be able to stay in their home until they decide to end the tenancy by giving two months' notice. It will be possible to agree to a shorter notice period with the landlord.
3. Ending of 'rental bidding'
Rental bidding is a practice whereby landlords or estate agents invite prospective tenants to make "bids" on rental properties that exceed the advertised asking rent in order to secure property. This practice will no longer be permitted and any advertisement for proposed letting must state the proposed rent. Even if the prospective tenant offers to pay more than that, landlords or their agents must not accept this offer and the property must be let for the rent as advertised.
4. Pets
Tenants will have a right to ask their landlords for consent to keep a pet (provided that they include a description of the pet) and such consent must not be unreasonably refused by the landlord. This will apply if the tenant permits the pet to live at the property even if the tenant is not the owner of the pet.
Interestingly, the Act defines the pet as an animal kept by a person mainly for personal interest, companionship, ornamental purposes, or any combination thereof. It will be interesting to see what animals will be recognised as pets under this definition.
5. Creation of a national landlord database
In an attempt to raise transparency and assist local authorities with enforcement, the Act will create a new private rented sector database and registration of landlords will be compulsory. While regulations will flesh out the specific details – such as costs of information and scope of details available to the public – both the landlord and their property will need to registered on the database before the property is marketed. There will be penalties if the property is let before registration has been completed, while in the case of the most serious offences (including giving fraudulent information to the database operator), landlords will face a civil penalty of up to £40,000 or criminal prosecution.
This is only a glimpse of the changes introduced by the Act and in the coming months we will cover any significant developments.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
