Lauren Elcock, a 31-year-old Londoner, is moving to Manchester because she cannot afford rent in London, where average monthly rents have risen to £2,736. She currently pays £850 a month for a room in a shared rental in north-east London, and her rent has increased by £250 a month over the past five years. After being made redundant in May 2025, she has juggled four jobs to make ends meet. Average UK private rents increased by 3.5% to £1,367 in the 12 months to September 2025, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Only five London postcodes still have sub-£800 average room rents, down from 81 in 2020, according to Spareroom.
A national housing demonstration on Saturday demanded more measures to make rent affordable, according to reports. The Renters' Rights Act, which comes into effect on 1 May 2026, is intended to address some of these concerns. The Act will ban 'no-fault' evictions (Section 21), according to the government. It will also abolish fixed-term tenancies, allowing renters to end tenancies at any time with two months' notice, according to the government. The Act requires landlords to give two months' notice to raise rent and can only increase rent once a year to the market rate, according to the government. Tenants can challenge excessive rent increases at a first-tier tribunal, according to the government. The Act ends 'bidding wars' so new tenants cannot be asked to pay more than the advertised price, according to the government. It also bans landlords from demanding more than one month's rent upfront, according to the government. The Act bans refusing applicants based on children or benefit status, according to the government. It requires landlords to respond to statutory pet requests within 28 days with reasonable grounds if refusing, according to the government. Under the Act, all tenancies will transition to rolling assured periodic agreements, according to the government. Notice periods will be extended to four months where a property is being sold, or reduced to four weeks in cases of rental arrears, according to the government.
Any enforcement action is only taken following robust legal advice and in cases where there are significant, persistent issues.
However, the reforms are prompting a landlord exodus. Nearly a quarter of a million rental properties (220,000) will disappear from the private rental sector in England by the end of 2026, according to Pepper Money research. About 5% of rented homes are set to disappear. The private rented sector saw its value decline by 5.1% (£48 billion) in 2025, the biggest drop this century, according to Savills data. Over the past three years, the total value of the rental sector has fallen by £79 billion and is now worth £1.47 trillion.
Pre-emptive evictions are on the rise. Increasing numbers of landlords are evicting tenants before the law changes to outlaw no-fault evictions, according to charities. Acorn reported that no-fault evictions made up one in five of the reports they received in October, rising to nearly one in three by January. A Spareroom survey found that 11% of all tenants have been evicted or received notice of an eviction since the Renters' Rights Act received Royal Assent.
While we don't comment on individual tenancies, we have never evicted anyone as a means to increase rents.
Kim Mansell, 36, has been living in Lady Florence Courtyard in Lewisham for five years and was served a no-fault eviction notice in June. Her landlord is the 999 Club, a London homelessness charity. The 999 Club increased Mansell's rent by 11% at the start of last year and advertised her flat at a price 36% higher than what she was paying. The 999 Club stated it has never evicted anyone as a means to increase rents.
Rent increases are widespread. A Spareroom survey found that 30% of tenants who have stayed in the same rental property have had their rents increased since the Renters' Rights Act received Royal Assent. London renters can use a property licensing checker on the Mayor of London's website to see if their landlord has the correct licence, according to Money Saving Expert (MSE). If a landlord does not have the correct licence, tenants could be due a refund of up to 12 months' rent, according to MSE.
If you do find that your landlord doesn't have the correct licence, the implications could be huge. You could be due a refund of up to 12 months' rent.
A national database for landlord licensing in England is set to replace the fragmented system later in 2026, according to reports. This aims to improve transparency and enforcement. However, several unknowns remain. It is unclear how many landlords are actually selling up versus staying in the market after the Renters' Rights Act. The government has not specified what measures it will introduce to address affordability beyond the Act. The number of tenants who have successfully challenged rent increases at tribunal under the new rules has not been confirmed. The timeline for the national landlord licensing database is uncertain, and the exact number of no-fault evictions occurring in the lead-up to the ban is not known.