Section 8 Notices.

Section 8 is a form of notice that a landlord can serve a tenant with an assured shorthold tenancy agreement. Additionally, a section 8 notice allows a landlord to terminate the tenancy during a fixed term (usually the first 6 months of tenancy in the UK), as long as there’s a valid ground for doing so.

There are 17 grounds for serving a section 8 notice, which is divided between mandatory and discretionary grounds.

The 17 grounds are split into both mandatory and discretionary grounds.

Mandatory grounds. If your application meets a mandatory ground, the court must grant an order of possession. Some of the mandatory grounds include:

• The landlord wants to move back into the property.
• Mortgage lender repossessing the property.
• The landlord intends to redevelop/demolish the property.
• Serious anti-social behaviour.

Discretionary grounds. If your application meets a discretionary ground, the court may grant an order of possession. Some of the discretionary grounds include:

• Persistent late payment of rent.
• Breach of the tenancy agreement
• Deterioration of the condition of the property.

For more information on the valid grounds to serve a section 8 notice, please call our solicitors on 020 3007 5500.

When serving a section 8 notice, you must ensure that the notice has been served properly. In instances, where the notice hasn’t properly been served it can invalidate the notice.

Our eviction solicitors advice to serve a section 8 notice in one of the following ways:

1. Personal delivery
2. Left at address
3. Recorded delivery
4. Process server
5. First-class post
6. Email

Proof that you have served the notice is vital, especially if the eviction was to be contested and the case was taken to court. An example of proof maybe a neutral third party witnessing you handing the notice to your tenant.

The eviction notice date laid out in the section 8 notice isn’t when a tenancy legally ends but more of a date to urge the tenant to move out. In an instance where the tenant hasn’t left by the notice date, you will need to legally enforce the eviction to reclaim possession.

In an instance where your tenant hasn’t left by the date set out in the section 8 notice, you will need to apply for a possession order. If the tenant still hasn’t vacated the premises following the possession order, you will need to apply for a warrant of possession from the courts.

If the warrant of possession is approved, the court will issue the tenant with an eviction notice with a date that they must legally vacate the property by. If the tenant was to ignore this eviction date, a bailiff will go to your property and evict the tenants.

Evicting your tenant through a section 8 notice may be as straight forward as instructing a solicitor to draft and serve notice, and the tenant leaves by the notice date.

Generally, our solicitors will charge the following for section 8 matters:

Recoverable costs – capped at £69.50 for legal fees and the court issue fee of £355. Although we’re offering fixed fees, we must make clear that this is subject to the notes. For any additional work outside of what our service outlines above, we will charge an hourly rate of £250 plus VAT.

Few eviction solicitors offer legal aid and while we would love to, the government only appoints a tiny number of law firms to offer these services. So for the time being, we can only accept privately funded cases.