The abolition of Section 21 isn’t really that big a deal, a prominent lettings agent claims.

Kristjan Byfield, who runs the base lettings agency in London and is the co-founder of PropTech platform The Depositary, says in a video interview that the long-promised abolition is not the terrifying onslaught that the industry initially believed.

S21 of the Housing Act was originally to be abolished by the Conservative government elected in 2019 but was effectively shelved following in-fighting amongst Conservative MPs. Now Labour is promising to include its abolition in its Renters Rights Bill to be launched in the autumn – with some observers believing that the abolition could form a stand-alone piece of legislation to allow quicker implementation. 

Now Byfield tells an Angels Media interviewer that 85% of tenancies end at the wish of the renter, not the landlord, while there will almost certainly still be elements of Section 8 that will still allow landlords to evict on grounds of rent arrears or anti-social behaviour. 

He accepts that with court delays, Section 8 evictions may take even longer than usual, but he insists that many landlords have (or certainly should have) insurance that could provide six or 12 months income in the event of non-payment or a void. 

He believes that as a result of all this, the scrapping of Section 21 will in fact only penalise a small 2% or 3% of the private rental sector landlord and agent base.

You can see an extract of the interview below and the full video podcast is here.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3oae6UjpHU