Landlord and Tenant Law Update: What Solicitors Need to Know in 2026

The Renters' Rights Act 2025 is the most significant change to the regulation of private renting in England for a generation, and unlike its predecessor — the Renters (Reform) Bill, which fell when the 2024 general election was called — it is no longer a proposal. It received Royal Assent on 27 October 2025, and its central reform, the abolition of Section 21 'no-fault' evictions and the move to a single system of periodic tenancies, has already commenced. For solicitors advising landlords and tenants, the practical challenge is no longer whether this reform is coming, but keeping precise track of which provisions are now live, which remain subject to secondary legislation, and what that means for files open today.

This update sets out the current implementation status as of September 2026, the practical mechanics of the transition for existing tenancies, the reformed grounds for possession, and the compliance obligations solicitors should be building into advice now.

Where implementation actually stands

The Act has been commenced in phases rather than in one go, and practitioners should be careful not to treat provisions that received Royal Assent as automatically in force — many depend on separate commencement regulations and, in some cases, further consultation.

The practical upshot is that the tenancy and possession framework — the part of the Act solicitors deal with most often on a day-to-day basis — is fully operational. The registration, redress and property-condition framework is not, and firms should treat gov.uk and legislation.gov.uk commencement instruments as the authoritative source before advising on any date, since the government has already used secondary legislation and transitional regulations to adjust the detail of the rollout since Royal Assent.

Transitioning existing tenancies: the practice points

1 May 2026 was not a prospective start date for new lettings only. On that date, existing assured shorthold tenancies — fixed-term and periodic alike — converted automatically by operation of law into assured periodic tenancies. Fixed terms ended, Section 21 became unavailable, and the new Section 8 grounds and Section 13 rent procedure applied from that point. Solicitors advising landlords with an existing portfolio should have already worked through, or should now urgently check, the following:

• The Information Sheet deadline. Landlords or agents were required to serve the Government's prescribed Information Sheet (or a written statement of terms, for wholly oral tenancies) within one month of conversion — in practice, by 31 May 2026 for tenancies that converted on 1 May 2026, and within one month of the start of any new tenancy granted since. Failure to serve it in time exposes a landlord to a civil penalty of up to £7,000, and — more significantly for possession work — can restrict the landlord's ability to rely on certain grounds until the position is remedied.
• Notices served before the changeover. Transitional provisions preserve the old regime for tenancies where a valid Section 21 or Section 8 notice was served before 1 May 2026 and court proceedings were issued by 31 July 2026; those tenancies continue as ASTs until the possession claim concludes. Anything outside that window falls under the new framework, regardless of when the tenancy itself began.
• Rent paid in advance. Existing tenancies that already held rent in advance may continue to do so until the tenancy ends, but new lettings are subject to the one-month advance rent cap, which changes how deposits and first-month arrangements should be documented going forward.
• Tenancy agreement drafting. Standard-form ASTs referencing fixed terms, rent review clauses tied to a fixed term, or break clauses no longer reflect the law and should be retired. Firms acting for institutional or portfolio landlords should treat this as a template-wide review, not a one-off amendment.

This kind of structural change in the underlying legal status of an existing contractual relationship also has knock-on effects outside pure landlord and tenant work — for example, where a residential investment property is being sold with sitting tenants, conveyancers need to correctly identify the tenancy's current status and notice history before exchange.

Grounds for possession: what changed

The Act replaces the old blanket Section 21 route with an expanded and renumbered set of Section 8 grounds, several of which are new. The core mandatory grounds solicitors will see most often include:

• Ground 1 (landlord or close family occupation) — four months' notice, and unavailable within the first 12 months of the tenancy.
• Ground 1A (sale of the property) — four months' notice, also unavailable within the first 12 months of the tenancy; critically, if the landlord does not proceed with the sale, the property cannot be re-let for 12 months, a trap for landlords who serve this ground speculatively.
• Ground 6 (demolition or substantial redevelopment) — four months' notice, available only where the landlord acquired their interest before the tenancy began.
• Ground 8 (serious rent arrears) — now set at at least three months' arrears (13 weeks for weekly or fortnightly rent) at both the date of notice and the date of the hearing, with four weeks' notice.
• Ground 7A (serious anti-social or criminal behaviour) — immediate, reflecting the seriousness of the conduct required.

The discretionary grounds (rent arrears below the Ground 8 threshold, breach of tenancy, deterioration of the property, and others) remain broadly familiar in substance but have been renumbered and, in places, modified. The practical risk for practitioners is procedural: serving the wrong ground, understating the arrears threshold, or serving a sale or family-occupation ground inside the new 12-month protected period will render a notice defective. Given that courts and tribunals are already absorbing a higher volume of contested possession work without a corresponding increase in resourcing, a defective notice now costs a client considerably more delay than it would have under the old regime.

Rent increases and the Section 13 route

Landlords can no longer increase rent through contractual review clauses; the only lawful route for the tenancies most solicitors will encounter is a Section 13 notice, served no more than once every 12 months, giving at least two months' notice of the proposed new rent. A tenant who considers the proposed rent to be above market rate can refer it to the First-tier Tribunal, and the tribunal's determination cannot exceed the rent the landlord proposed. Solicitors advising landlords should build the annual Section 13 cycle into standing instructions for managed portfolios, and advise tenant clients that a tribunal referral carries no rent penalty for having challenged it, which changes the risk calculus tenants previously faced.

Compliance still to come: database, ombudsman and property standards

Firms advising landlords on portfolio compliance should treat the registration and redress framework as imminent rather than distant. Once live, registration on the Private Rented Sector Database and membership of the new Ombudsman scheme will be preconditions for lawfully marketing, letting or serving certain possession notices in respect of a property — mirroring how deposit protection non-compliance already restricts a landlord's position today. Awaab's Law and the Decent Homes Standard will, once extended to the private sector, impose statutory repair timescales and minimum condition requirements with civil and criminal sanctions for non-compliance; the long lead times reflect the scale of retrofit involved, but landlords with older stock should not wait for a final commencement date before starting condition surveys.

This is one strand of a much wider run of property law reform moving through Parliament and secondary legislation at the same time; firms advising on residential property more broadly should also be tracking the parallel reforms to the leasehold and commonhold system, which we cover in our update on leasehold and freehold reform.

Frequently asked questions

Has Section 21 been fully abolished?

Yes, for the tenancies the Act covers. Since 1 May 2026, Section 21 notices can no longer be served on new or converted assured tenancies. The only surviving use of the old regime is the narrow transitional window for notices validly served, and proceedings issued, before that date.

Do all existing tenancy agreements need to be reissued?

No new written agreement is legally required simply because a tenancy converted to an assured periodic tenancy by operation of law, but landlords were required to serve the prescribed Information Sheet or written statement within one month of conversion, and should update their standing documentation so that future correspondence and rent notices reflect the periodic, not fixed-term, status of the tenancy.

Is the Private Rented Sector Database live yet?

Not as of September 2026. The government's roadmap points to a rollout beginning late 2026, with mandatory Ombudsman membership following once the database is operational, expected around 2028. Advice given now should flag this as a forthcoming, not current, obligation, and firms should monitor gov.uk for the commencement regulations that will fix the exact dates.

What is the biggest risk for solicitors advising landlords right now?

Procedural error in possession notices — citing the wrong ground, misjudging the arrears threshold for Ground 8, or serving a sale or occupation ground within the protected 12-month period — is currently the most common cause of failed or delayed claims, compounded by court and tribunal capacity pressures that make correcting a defective notice costly in time as well as money.

The tenancy and possession provisions of the Renters' Rights Act are now live, but the reform is not finished, and further secondary legislation will continue to land through 2026, 2027 and beyond. Solicitors advising landlords and tenants need a live, not static, working knowledge of the commencement position. Learnsignal's CPD courses for legal professionals are updated as this legislation progresses, making them a practical way to keep housing law knowledge current as each phase comes into force.