What is a resident landlord?

Where the owner of the property lives in the same building, a letting is generally excluded from the definition of an AT (or AST). But the resident landlord rules cannot apply if the landlord insurance customer is a company, and the landlord must be occupying the property as his main home at the time the tenancy is granted. There are two types of resident landlord situation that now apply:

1. Where the landlord insurance customer shares accommodation with a licensee (i.e. lodgers).
2. Where the tenant occupies self-contained accommodation in the same building, provided this is not a purpose-built block of flats (e.g. if the landlord insurance customer has converted a large house into flats and lives in one of them). Here, a tenancy will be created but it will be regulated under the ‘common law’ and not the Housing Act 1988. In Scotland, the situation is different: a tenant who occupies self-contained accommodation in a converted house would automatically be on an AT. To fall outside the Housing (Scotland) Act 1988, the landlord insurance customer must have some means of access through the tenant’s accommodation or vice versa.

Resident landlords insurance customers have the following legal advantages:

• The tenant cannot refer the rent to the Rent Assessment Committee.
• The minimum two-month notice period as for shortholds does not apply.
• Any damage deposit taken will not be subject to the tenancy deposit protection rules and will not have to be protected in one of the schemes.
• The protection from eviction legislation does not always apply.
• The statutory succession provisions do not apply.

However:

• Resident landlords insurance customers cannot use the accelerated possession procedure if they need to evict their tenants.

If the landlord insurance policy holder (or all of them if there is more than one) ceases to live at the property as his (or their) main home, the resident landlord exceptions will cease to apply.

Cheap landlord insurance policy is designed and catered to protect the residential landlord from risks associated with letting their buy-to-let property.

---