28 Jun 2021
Landlords, have you recently issued or received a ‘notice to quit’?
Are you a landlord in the private rented sector? Have you experience of giving a tenant, or a tenant giving you notice to leave the property (‘notice to quit’)? If so, we want to hear from you.
CIH Northern Ireland is carrying out research on private tenancies and ‘notice to quit’ periods on behalf of the Department for Communities. We want to learn more about the experiences of landlords who have previously gone through the process of issuing or receiving a ‘notice to quit’. As the department seeks to amend the legislation, it is important to us that your voice is reflected in that change.
Examples of things we are interested to know:
- If you considered the time period provided to be sufficient
- The reason for the ‘notice to quit’
- What you consider to be a reasonable notice period
The current legislation in Northern Ireland requires landlords to issue a notice to tenants 12 weeks in advance of the household having to vacate the property. This was amended in May 2020 through the Private Tenancies Act (NI) in the context of the coronavirus pandemic, taking into consideration the risks involved in moving home and the difficulty in finding a new home in this timeframe amidst the health crisis. This legislation is due to end on 30 September 2021.Prior to this, the length of notice period was dependent on the length of time tenants lived in the property. For the vast majority of tenants, the average time spent living in a property is less than five years, in these instances the ‘notice to quit’ period was 28 days. For tenants living in a property between five and ten years, landlords had to give at least eight weeks' notice to quit and for tenants living in a property for over ten years, landlords had to give a minimum of 12 weeks' notice.
*Landlords should only complete the below survey if they have experience of tenants leaving the property
