[2025] UKUT 263 (LC)

When a property is let on a statutory periodic tenancy (after the end of an assured tenancy), or on an assured tenancy where there is no provision for rent review, section 13 of the Housing Act 1988 provides that a landlord may serve upon the tenant a notice proposing a new rent to take effect on a specified date. That date must be at the start of a new period of the tenancy, and in the case of a monthly tenancy will be at least one month after the date of the notice. The new rent will take effect on that date unless before then the tenant refers the matter to the FTT.

If the tenant does so, the FTT has jurisdiction to determine a market rent for the property, on certain specified assumptions, in accordance with section 14. Section 14(7) reads as follows:

“(7)

Where a notice under section 13(2) above has been referred to [the FTT] , then, unless the landlord and the tenant otherwise agree, the rent determined by [the FTT] … shall be the rent under the tenancy with effect from the beginning of the new period specified in the notice or, if it appears to [the FTT] that that would cause undue hardship to the tenant, with effect from such later date (not being later than the date the rent is determined) as [the FTT] may direct.