Tenants Rights - Changes to the rules

The Civil Procedure Rules are being amended and some of those amendments have consequences for mortgage lenders who have mortgages over tenanted (rather than owner-occupied) property.

In particular the rule changes will allow tenants about whom the lender has no knowledge (that is to say tenants who the property owner has not told the lender about!) who are living in a mortgaged property to apply to the court for postponement of any repossession order granted in favour of the lender.

That obviously has repercussions for lenders being able to sell the property to recover their loan.

The new rules also require lenders to notify tenants and occupiers of a property before taking steps to enforce a possession order.

In those circumstances any tenant who the lender has had no previous knowledge of can apply to the lender for a delay repossession to allow the tenant time to find another home.

If the lender does not agree to an extension of time the tenant may apply to the court for a decision.

At the moment we can only speculate about what effect these changes may have on the willingness of lenders to make mortgage advances to landlords in relation to "buy to let" properties.

Changes to the Building Regulations

The Government has published two new sets of legislation relating to the building control regime in England and Wales.

Many of the changes in the new regulations deal with "tidying up" the current regulations in order to make them easier to understand (we hope!)

In addition, though, there are also some more meaty changes - including the widening of the provisions for self-certification to cover a greater range of activities which deal with the improvement of the energy efficiency of a building.

A proper understanding of the new provisions is vital for anyone who regularly deals with building control issues- especially those businesses whose bread and butter is dealing with construction and property.

The new rules come into force on 1 October 2010, but it may be some while after that before detailed guidance is published.  Until that guidance is forthcoming, anyone seeking clarification on the new regulations will need to look at the government's documentation showing the differences between the 2000 and 2010 regulations.