Standards improve in British rental properties – but safety still falls short

Since 2014, a whole raft of new legislation has been introduced by the UK and devolved governments to improve tenants’ lives. Rental market insurer AXA has tracked progress over the past four years, and finds significant leaps forward in landlords’ professional standards1, but safety is still compromised in too many rentals.

Despite a broadly improving picture, the private rental sector still has catching up to do on important areas like fire and gas safety. Every rental property requires an annual gas safety inspection – but just 58 per cent have had this check in the past 12 months.

Four in ten tenants, meanwhile, say they do not have smoke alarms installed, despite landlords being legally required to fit them on each floor of a property. This is still a marked improvement on 2014, prior to the rule being introduced, when six in ten tenants lacked them.

Two other key requirements are that landlords provide an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) to tenants, and (in England and Wales) the Government’s ‘How to Rent’ Guide, which informs them of their rights and responsibilities.  As yet, only a third of tenants say they have seen the EPC (up from 19 per cent in 2014), and just 15 per cent of those eligible have received the Government’s mandatory guide.

AXA notes that landlords too compromise their rights with these omissions, as those who have not provided the guide, EPC and gas safety certificate cannot evict a tenant under a Section 21 notice.

While recent legislation has increased pressure on landlords to raise their game, there is still little awareness among tenants of basic rights and entitlements. This means vital consumer pressure to push standards up further is largely absent.