Tenancy law is a complex area and there are many factors which determine the rights and responsibilities of both tenants and landlords. These are:

• The contract: The basis of the relationship between landlord and tenant is a contractual one, based upon the tenancy agreement. Provided they are legal, the terms of the tenancy agreement will be enforceable.
• Legislation: Many different pieces of legislation create specific rights, powers and obligations, over and above those conveyed by the tenancy agreement. For example, many rent and housing acts passed by parliament have created different types of tenancy, and have specified the number of rights and obligations which accompany these. The most recent example of this is the implied clause for all social tenancies introduced by the Social Housing (Regulation) Act to enforce Awaab’s Law. This gives tenants the right to take landlords to court if they fail to address specified hazards in the home in the timeframes set out in Awaab’s Law.
• Common-law: This is a body of law that has developed over the years as a result of past decisions made by the courts.
• Regulation: Social landlords have to adhere to a set of regulatory requirements. Although these do not directly confer legal rights on to individual tenants, they do impact on the policy decisions that landlords can make and therefore help to shape the relationship between them and their tenants. The current set of regulatory requirements relating to tenancies is available online.

Housing professionals are likely to work with many different types of tenancy. Different types of tenancy convey different legal rights on to tenants, and much of the day to day business of managing tenancies will need to be carried out differently depending on the type of tenancy in use.