A residential landlord's ability to serve a no-fault section 21 notice was abolished on 1 May 2026. Now a thing of the past, if a residential landlord needs to obtain possession of their property, they can no longer serve their tenant with 2 months' notice; instead, they must serve a section 8 notice under the Housing Act 1988 and rely on one of the grounds for possession.
Post 1 May 2026, new grounds have been introduced into the 1988 Housing Act to allow landlords to regain possession, some existing grounds have been amended, and there are now new notice periods that must be given if a landlord wants to rely on one of those grounds.
For any landlord who served a section 21 notice before the abolition date, it is worth clarifying where that notice now stands. Provided the notice was validly served before 1 May 2026, it remains enforceable, but only for a limited window.
A landlord relying on one of these notices has until the earlier of 6 months from the date it was served or 31 July 2026 to issue a claim for possession at Court. If that deadline passes without proceedings being issued, the notice simply lapses, and the tenancy becomes an assured periodic tenancy, at which point the landlord is back to needing a section 8 ground like everybody else. Landlords who are still sitting on a section 21 notice served earlier this year and have not yet gone to Court should treat that 31 July deadline as a hard cut-off rather than something to leave until the last minute, particularly given how stretched Court diaries currently are.
When a landlord could serve a no-fault section 21 notice, there was also a procedure called accelerated possession, where a landlord could obtain a Court Order without attending a hearing, as the Court would decide the case on paper if all the documentation was in order. This is now abolished, and no accelerated possession procedure allows a landlord to obtain a possession order swiftly.
The shift to the section 8 system means that some grounds for possession require the Court to make a mandatory possession order, for example, if the landlord wants to occupy the house themselves or with their family, or if there are rent arrears that meet the criteria for a possession order.
However, there are also nine discretionary grounds for possession, such as persistent rent arrears, antisocial behaviour, or suitable alternative accommodation, where a Court still has a discretion as to whether to make a possession order.
It is worth setting out which grounds landlords are actually relying on in practice, since the detail matters considerably more under section 8 than it ever did under section 21, where a landlord did not need to give any reason at all.
Ground 1 remains the mandatory ground for a landlord, or their family member, wanting to move back into the property, and now requires 4 months' notice rather than the 2 months that applied previously.
A new mandatory ground, Ground 1A, has been introduced specifically for landlords who intend to sell; this also carries a 4 month notice period, cannot be used within the first 12 months of a tenancy, and comes with a restriction preventing the landlord from re-letting the property for 12 months if the sale does not go ahead, breach of which can expose the landlord to a civil penalty.
The mandatory rent arrears ground, Ground 8, still requires at least 2 months of arrears to be outstanding at the date of the notice and again at the date of the hearing, but the notice period has been lengthened from 2 weeks to 4 weeks. Ground 14, covering antisocial behaviour, remains discretionary but can still be served with immediate effect where the circumstances justify it.
The nine discretionary grounds also include rent arrears that fall short of the Ground 8 threshold, breach of tenancy conditions, deterioration of the property or its contents through the tenant's neglect, and the availability of suitable alternative accommodation, among others.
Landlords and their advisers need to be far more precise than before about which ground, or combination of grounds, is being relied upon, and about assembling the evidence to support it, because, unlike under the old section 21 procedure, the Court is not simply checking a landlord's paperwork; it is deciding whether the ground itself is made out.
The loss of accelerated possession compounds that evidential burden. A landlord bringing a claim now has to expect at least one hearing, and in most Court areas realistically longer than that if the tenant defends the claim or if a discretionary ground is in play and the Court is weighing reasonableness. Landlords should factor this into their timescales at the outset rather than assuming a possession order will follow shortly after the notice expires, and should keep thorough records from the very start of a tenancy, including rent statements, correspondence about any breaches, and anything relevant to the ground being relied upon, since this is now the evidence that will need to be put before the Court.
Landlords should also be aware that the consequences of getting a Section 8 claim wrong are more serious than under the old regime. Knowingly or recklessly misusing a ground for possession, for example, serving a Ground 1A notice on the pretence of an intention to sell that does not exist, is now a specific offence, and a tenant who has been misled in this way can apply for a Rent Repayment Order of up to 2 years' rent. Landlords relying on Grounds 1 or 1A in particular need to be able to demonstrate a genuine intention at the time the notice is served, not simply a convenient form of words.
Several related changes came into force alongside the abolition of section 21, which affects how landlords now need to plan. Fixed-term tenancies are no longer permitted; every assured tenancy, whether new or converted from an existing assured shorthold tenancy, now runs on a rolling periodic basis from the outset, which removes the option some landlords previously relied on of simply not renewing a fixed term.
Rent increases can now be implemented only once a year, using the section 13 procedure and the prescribed Form 4A, with at least 2 months' notice. A tenant who considers the proposed rent to be above the open market rate can refer the increase to the First-tier Tribunal.
A further phase of the reforms, the Private Rented Sector database, is expected later in 2026. Once it is in force, landlords who have not registered are likely to find certain grounds for possession unavailable to them, so this is worth keeping under review.
The Conservative government's earlier proposals for this reform, the Renters (Reform) Bill, would only have abolished section 21 once the Court system had been reformed to cope with the additional volume of claims. That Bill did not pass before the 2024 general election. It was the Labour government, through the Renters' Rights Act 2025, which removed that conditionality and set 1 May 2026 as a fixed commencement date regardless of Court readiness.
Concerns about County Court capacity were raised repeatedly during the Bill's passage, by the judiciary, the Law Society and landlord bodies among others, and those concerns have not gone away now that the new regime is in force; landlords bringing possession claims should expect the resulting pressure on hearing lists to affect how long a claim now takes from start to finish, and should plan accordingly rather than assuming the process will move at the pace the old section 21 procedure did.
If you are a landlord considering how best to regain possession of a property under the new rules, or you have a section 21 notice served before 1 May 2026 that you need to act on before the 31 July deadline, our team would be happy to advise on the ground most likely to apply to your circumstances and the evidence you will need to bring a successful claim.
This information is for guidance purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. We recommend you seek legal advice before acting on any information given.
