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Do you know your responsibilities as a landlord?

It’s a serious business being a landlord. From the moment you take on that role, you also accept a whole host of responsibilities – first and foremost, of course, to your tenants and the tenancy agreement you made.

Duty of care

The headline of the official government website makes crystal clear that a landlord’s paramount responsibility is to maintain a let property safe and free from any health hazards.

Echoing this warning, Citizens Advice (England) specifically refers to the Defective Premises Act 1972. This imposes on the landlord a statutory duty of care to maintain the let property free of any defects that might cause personal injury to others or damage to their property.

It places on the landlord a statutory duty not only to repair and maintain the property but also to enter it in order to do so. Even if the tenant has not informed the landlord, the latter has a duty of care if he or she knows or ought to know about the relevant defects.

It is not only legislation but common law too that also makes a landlord potentially negligent for any action – or failure to act – that results in injury or property damage suffered by a tenant, one of their visitors, a neighbour or even a member of the public. This arises from the principle of a so-called “duty of care” owed by the landlord to his tenants and third parties.

Breaching your duty of care

If you breach your duty of care as a landlord – by causing harm or failing to take all reasonable precautions for preventing someone from coming to harm – you may be held liable for your negligence and, as a result, ordered to pay the injured party damages by way of reparation.

Depending on the seriousness of the personal injury sustained or the loss or damage to property involved those damages may be very substantial.

For that reason, landlord insurance policies typically include provision for indemnity against this liability – hence, the various terms which you might see referring to landlord liability indemnity insurance, public liability insurance, or simply property owner’s liability insurance. The cover indemnifies you against claims made by your tenants – or indeed anyone else visiting or affected by your property.

Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards (MEES)

In an effort to ensure that accommodation in the private rented sector continues to improve, the government has also imposed restrictions on the energy efficiency of let dwellings.

Since April 2020, for instance, in England and Wales any let property must have an energy performance certificate (EPC) rating of at least an E. Landlords who continue to let a property falling below these standards face fines of up to £5,000.

These standards are subject to review and the government is currently in consultation with the relevant parties about raising the minimum MEES requirement to an EPC rating of C and above by the year 2030.

Employers’ liability insurance

If you employ other people in your business as a buy to let landlord, you also have a duty of care toward your employees. The law requires that you have employers’ liability insurance of at least £5 million so that you can meet any claims from employees – or former employees – who were injured in their work for you or who contracted a longer-term illness.

Note that most landlord insurance policies do not include employers’ liability insurance as a standard part of their cover. So, if you have cleaners and letting agents for example, whom you employ to work at your property, you may need to consider this protection.

Further statutory responsibilities – health and safety

As we have seen, the law makes clear that, as a landlord, you are responsible for the health and safety of your tenants and the let accommodation they occupy. There are several pieces of legislation designed to enforce those standards and the offences you commit if and when they are breached:

Gas

Electricity

Fire safety

  • landlords also have a statutory duty to ensure all reasonable fire safety precautions are taken in their let property;
  • if you are the landlord of a House in Multiple Occupation (HMO), you will know that the fire safety requirements are more stringent still – involving risk assessments, fire detection and warning systems, fire doors, and signs and notices indicating fire escape routes;
  • indeed, with effect from the 23rd of January 2023, in blocks of apartments or flats over 11 metres high a “responsible person” must carry out checks of all fire doors in communal areas every quarter and annual checks on the doors to every entrance of the flats – with appropriate information handed to every tenant about the importance to fire safety of fire doors;
  • in addition to these specific requirements for HMOs, in its fire safety overview published on the 30th of January 2023, the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) argues that a fire safety risk assessment will be a prudent precaution for every let property;
  • as the London Fire Brigade also points out, the law requires every floor in any let property to have at least one fire alarm installed and a carbon monoxide detector in any room in which there is a solid fuel-burning appliance;

Housing Health and Safety Rating System

  • local authorities maintain overall monitoring of the potential risks and hazards to health and safety in private rented accommodation;
  • helping to do this is the power to inspect let properties and use a risk evaluation tool called the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS) – which examines a range of potential trouble spots and scores them according to the seriousness of any defects;

Tenants’ deposits

  • landlords customarily request a deposit from a tenant as security against damage or breakages
  • for any tenancy that started after the 6th of April 2007, the landlord has a legal responsibility for placing that deposit for safekeeping with a registered, government-approved tenancy deposit scheme;
  • at the end of the tenancy, the landlord needs to agree with the tenant on the amount of the deposit that is to be returned – that is to say, the initial amount, less any deductions for damage or breakages;
  • if the two parties are unable to agree on their respective shares of the money, the tenancy deposit scheme offers a free arbitration service to resolve any disagreement. Read more here with our Guide to tenancies

These are the principal responsibilities you assume the moment you become a landlord. They are devised principally to protect the health and safety of your tenants but may also make for the avoidance of doubt regarding the respective responsibilities between you and your tenants.

Further reading:

Your legal obligations as a landlord

Landlord legislation guide

Landlords’ guide to health and safety.

Please note the information provided above is based on current information available and may be liable to change in the wake of amendments to existing legislation. Legislation may vary in England, Wales and Scotland.