Student tenancy agreements after the Renters’ Rights Act, and how to leave a joint contract

How the Renters' Rights Act 2025 changes student tenancies

The Renters’ Rights Act 2025 got Royal Assent in October 2025 and its main tenancy changes started on 1 May 2026. It applies to England only; Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own renting law. For a private house share, the big change is that an assured tenancy can no longer have an end date. Most existing assured shorthold tenancies turned into assured periodic tenancies on 1 May 2026. Signed for this year back in January? Your contract is now a rolling one, whatever the paperwork says. If it was drafted before May it may still show an end date and a break clause. Neither decides when you can leave any more. I checked every rule on this page against GOV.UK’s tenant and landlord guidance, Shelter’s joint-tenancy advice and Unipol’s student guidance on 28 September 2026, and the two-month tenant notice rule is the same in all three.

You don’t need a new agreement. Your landlord or agent had to give you the government’s Renters’ Rights Act information sheet by 31 May 2026. To leave, you give at least two months’ notice in writing. GOV.UK’s tenant guidance says a letter, email or text all count. The notice has to end on the last day of a rent period, which is the day before your rent is due. You and the landlord can agree a shorter notice period in writing. On a joint tenancy your notice ends the tenancy for your housemates too, which is covered below.

Landlords of student houses get one extra route to take the house back for the next intake. It’s called Ground 4A, and it’s narrow. The house has to be an HMO. Every tenant has to have been a full-time student when they signed, or been expected to become one. The landlord must have warned you in writing, before you signed, that they might use it. The tenancy must have been signed less than six months before you could move in, and they must plan to let to students again. Then they give you four months’ notice, and your leaving date has to fall between 1 June and 30 September. No written warning, no Ground 4A. (GOV.UK’s landlord guidance sets one exception for the 2026 changeover: landlords had until 31 May 2026 to give that warning and could serve two months’ notice between 1 May and 30 July.)

Section 21 ‘no-fault’ evictions ended on 1 May 2026, even if your tenancy agreement still mentions them. A landlord now needs a legal ground, such as rent arrears, selling the property or Ground 4A, and a court order if you don’t leave. Rent rises changed too. Rent can only go up once a year, not in the first 12 months of a new tenancy, using the government’s Form 4A (a section 13 notice, nothing to do with Ground 4A) with at least two months’ warning. If the new figure is above the going rate, you can challenge it at the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) before it takes effect.

Purpose-built student accommodation (PBSA) vs private rentals

Halls work differently. Private halls whose provider is in the ANUK/Unipol National Code, and university halls under the UUK/Guild code, sit outside the new assured tenancy rules. You’ll most likely sign a common law tenancy or a licence to occupy, and your rights are whatever that contract says. The provider should tell you which code it belongs to; if it can’t, ask why.

Those contracts can still be fixed-term, usually 44 or 51 weeks, and the two-month notice right doesn’t come with them. Leaving early depends on the release terms and on any reason the code allows. Unipol’s student guidance says early release is unlikely without one. Some providers let you go once your room is re-let. That’s their policy, and they can change it.

Halls prices usually include bills and house shares usually don’t, which makes the sticker prices hard to compare. Take a £450-a-month room in a house against a £550 bills-included room in halls. If energy, water and broadband come to £115 a month between them, the house room costs £565 and is the dearer of the two. Put your own figures into the rent affordability calculator before you decide which is cheap.

Code members also commit to repair response times. A house-share landlord has the legal repair duties below and no promised timetable for anything that isn’t an emergency.

Deposits, fees and upfront costs in tenancy agreements

Before you get the keys you’ll usually pay a holding deposit, which takes the house off the market while the agent runs references. In England the Tenant Fees Act 2019 caps it at one week’s rent (monthly rent x 12 / 52). If the tenancy goes ahead it has to come back to you within seven days, or with your agreement go towards the first month’s rent or the deposit.

The main deposit covers the landlord against damage or unpaid rent. In England it’s capped at five weeks’ rent where the annual rent is under £50,000, so on £500 a month the most they can take is £576.92 (£500 x 12 / 52 x 5).

The landlord then has 30 days to put it in a government-backed protection scheme, which in England and Wales means the Deposit Protection Service, mydeposits or the Tenancy Deposit Scheme, and to give you the details of where it’s held. Keep that email with the tenancy agreement.

Don’t transfer a deposit before you’ve seen the house in person and checked the landlord or agent is who they say they are.

Everything else is banned in England unless the Act lists it. The permitted payments are rent, the holding deposit, the deposit, a fee of up to £50 if you ask to change the tenancy, what you owe if you leave early by agreement, bills such as council tax, utilities and broadband if the contract makes you responsible, and two default fees: a lost key and rent more than 14 days late. Admin, referencing and check-out fees aren’t on the list. Wales and Scotland ban them under their own laws.

Guarantors and rent in advance

A guarantor signs up to pay your rent if you don’t. Most private student lets ask for a UK-based one, usually a parent or guardian, and the agent will credit-check them before the contract is finalised.

If you fall behind, the landlord can go to your guarantor for the money, and if neither of you pays they can take you both to the county court. Read the guarantee before your parent signs it. On a joint tenancy some guarantees cover the whole house’s rent.

International students and care leavers often can’t provide a UK guarantor. Landlords used to get round that by asking for six or twelve months’ rent up front. Under the Renters’ Rights Act, once you’ve signed, a landlord can ask for at most one month’s rent before the tenancy starts.

That pushes more students towards paid guarantor services such as Housing Hand, which stand as your UK guarantor for a non-refundable fee. Get the fee quoted on your actual rent, because it comes on top of the deposit.

Joint tenancies vs individual contracts

Rent a house with friends and you’ll usually sign one joint tenancy. That makes each of you jointly and severally liable for all the rent and the state of the house. Legally, the group is one tenant.

So if a housemate drops out and stops paying, the landlord can take their share from the rest of you. Damage to the living room comes out of the shared deposit whoever did it, and being away that weekend doesn’t change that.

Put the bills in more than one name in the first week, so one person isn’t the only one legally on the hook for the energy account.

Individual room contracts cut that link: another tenant’s arrears aren’t yours, and their notice doesn’t end your tenancy. Halls almost always use them, and some private landlords offer them too. My view: if you’ve got real doubts about one of the group, pay the extra for a room contract. A joint tenancy with someone you don’t trust is the most expensive thing on this page.

Leaving a joint tenancy mid-year

One of you wants out and the rest want to stay. Because every private house share is now periodic, an old rule matters much more: any one joint tenant can give notice to quit without the others’ permission. The notice is at least two months, in writing, ending on the last day of a rent period. When it expires, the tenancy ends for everyone in the house.

Say rent is due on the 15th and one housemate emails the landlord notice on or before 14 October. The tenancy can end on 14 December for the whole house. The landlord can offer the others a new tenancy, but doesn’t have to, and anyone still living there after the end date without one can be evicted through the courts. You can’t take a notice back on your own either; Unipol’s student guidance says it only stands withdrawn if the landlord and the other joint tenants agree. Talk to the house before anyone sends it.

If the person leaving just moves out without giving notice, they’re still a joint tenant. The landlord can chase them, or any of you, for all the rent and any damage until the tenancy properly ends.

The clean exit is a replacement. The landlord and every joint tenant have to agree to the new person. The landlord will usually reference them. Shelter’s advice is that everyone staying, the newcomer and the landlord sign a new joint tenancy that replaces the old one. If a replacement moves in without the landlord agreeing, the person who left is still on the tenancy and the newcomer has fewer rights than you.

What to check before signing your tenancy agreement

Check the rent, the payment dates and the bank details against what the agent told you. Then look for any clause that still mentions a fixed term or a break clause. Since 1 May, those don’t govern when you can leave.

On move-in day, go through the inventory room by room and photograph anything already marked, broken or stained, with the date showing. Email the photos to the agent that day.

If the agent promises something out loud (a new mattress, a cleaner before you move in), get it in writing before you sign.

A clause saying you must pay for professional cleaning when you leave isn’t enforceable in England; the Tenant Fees Act bans it. You have to hand the house back as clean as you got it, allowing for fair wear and tear.

Repairs are split by law. Under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 the landlord keeps the structure and exterior in repair, plus the water, gas, electricity, sanitation, heating and hot water. You change the lightbulbs, put the bins out and open a window when you dry washing indoors.

Landlords in England also have to do a Right to Rent immigration check before the tenancy starts. British and Irish citizens can usually use a passport. International students prove their status with a share code from their Home Office online account. Physical biometric residence permits haven’t been accepted for Right to Rent since April 2022.

Dealing with tenancy agreement disputes

Report repairs the way your agreement says, which is often an online portal, and always in writing. Dates matter later.

If the landlord ignores something serious, like no heating in November, contact your council’s environmental health team. They can inspect and serve an improvement notice. Don’t hold back rent to force the repair. That puts you in arrears, and arrears are a ground for possession.

At the end of the tenancy you don’t have to accept a deduction you think is wrong. Every protection scheme runs a free dispute service, where an adjudicator compares the check-in inventory, your photos and the landlord’s evidence. Fair wear and tear isn’t yours to pay for, so scuffs from a year of normal living can’t come out of your deposit.