Section 21 Is Gone. Here’s What UK Landlords Are Actually Doing About It.

Since 1 May 2026, Section 21 no-fault evictions no longer exist in England. Every assured shorthold tenancy has converted to an open-ended periodic tenancy, and a landlord who needs a property back now has to prove specific legal grounds under Section 8, not simply give notice and wait. For anyone who relies on being able to get a property back on their own timeline, that’s the actual change worth understanding — not the headlines around it.

What changed, specifically

The Renters’ Rights Act received Royal Assent on 27 October 2025. Its core reform came into force on 1 May 2026: assured shorthold tenancies and Section 21 no-fault evictions were abolished, and every private tenancy in England became a periodic assured tenancy with no fixed end date. Reclaiming a property now means meeting one of the defined grounds under Section 8 — a sale, moving in a family member, and a handful of others — rather than simply waiting out a fixed term or serving notice without a reason.

Why this changes the calculation, not just the paperwork

For most of the tenancies, this isn’t really about compliance admin. It’s about certainty. A landlord who might need a property back — for a sale, a change in circumstances, a family member needing somewhere to live — no longer has a simple, guaranteed route to that. The property hasn’t changed. What’s changed is how much a landlord can rely on the old way of managing it.

That’s the moment a lot of landlords start looking at alternatives, and the first one that comes to mind is usually the same: hand it to someone else.

The instinct most landlords reach for first

For a landlord who’d rather not run a property day to day regardless of any of this, handing it to a letting or management agent is a completely reasonable call. But it isn’t free, and it’s worth knowing the actual cost before defaulting to it. Full management typically costs 15-30% of what a property earns, on top of the 10-15% platforms already take just to keep it listed — whether the property is let long-term or short-term. That’s two separate cuts taken before any profit is seen, and neither one teaches a landlord anything about running the property differently.

The alternative, run properly

Short-term letting is the other route, and it isn’t the constant guest-juggling most people picture from the outside. Run properly, it hands back almost exactly what a periodic tenancy takes away.

Calendar control is the biggest one. Nothing is locked in for months at a time, so a property can be blocked off for a sale, a family member, or renovations whenever it’s actually needed — not whenever a tenancy happens to end.

Property condition is another. A short let ends in a professional clean after every stay, which means problems surface within days, not at the end of a year nobody’s actually inspected.

None of this happens on its own. It’s a different set of systems — pricing, screening, turnover, guest communication — built once and run consistently, not reinvented from scratch every week. That’s the actual work of switching over, and it’s also the part most people underestimate before they start.

Systems beat properties

Nothing about the property itself changed on 1 May. What changed is how much a landlord can lean on the old way of running it. For anyone weighing whether short-term letting is actually worth the switch, it’s worth working out the real numbers before deciding anything — what a specific property could realistically earn, and what it’s currently costing to keep doing things the old way.

This article covers general trends and is not financial, tax, or legal advice. Property-specific decisions should involve a qualified accountant or solicitor familiar with your circumstances.

Explore more articles, free tools, and the full course at saoperationsblueprint.com.