Renting Homes Wales Act 2016 Guide | Occupation Contracts

What is the Renting Homes (Wales) Act?

The Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 is the law that replaced assured shorthold tenancies (ASTs) in Wales with a new framework called occupation contracts. It came fully into force on 1 December 2022. If you let residential property anywhere in Wales, your agreement with your contract-holders (tenants) is an occupation contract, not an AST, whatever paperwork you started with.

Most private landlords use a standard contract. Secure contracts are reserved for local authority and housing association lets and don't apply to private landlords. (Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016, ss.7, 9, Part 2; gov.wales/housing-law-changed-renting-homes)

Occupation contract vs the old tenancy agreement: what changed

The legal name for the agreement, the person renting from you, and the notices you serve to end it all changed on 1 December 2022. Here's what's different for a standard contract, the type almost every private landlord uses:

Aspect	Before 1 December 2022	Now: occupation contract
Occupant is legally called	Tenant, under an assured shorthold tenancy	Contract-holder, under a standard occupation contract
Governing law	Housing Act 1988	Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016
Written agreement	Tenancy agreement	Written statement of contract, required within 14 days
No-fault notice	No longer available in Wales	Section 173 notice (Form RHW16), minimum 6 months' notice (s.174), can't be served in the contract's first 6 months (s.175)
Serious rent-arrears notice	No longer available in Wales	Ground under s.181 (periodic) / s.187 (fixed-term), notice under s.182/s.188, both on Form RHW20

Any tenancy already running on 1 December 2022 converted automatically to a standard occupation contract that day — landlords didn't need to do anything to trigger the conversion itself, but a written statement still had to follow. (Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016, Part 2; gov.wales/housing-law-changed-renting-homes)

What must be in the written statement — and what if I don't provide one?

The written statement is your occupation contract's paperwork. You must give your contract-holder one within 14 days of the occupation date. It has three layers: key matters on page one (names, property address, occupation date, rent and payment details); fundamental terms set by Welsh Government that can't be removed or weakened (repairing obligations, fitness for human habitation, requirements for possession proceedings); and supplementary terms — model terms that apply by default but can be varied by agreement.

Miss the 14-day deadline and the consequences aren't cosmetic: you cannot validly serve a section 173 no-fault notice while a written statement is outstanding, and your contract-holder can bring a compensation claim against you for the failure. If you've never issued one, get it done before you worry about anything else.

How much notice do I have to give to end a contract with no reason?

Ending a standard periodic contract without giving a reason means serving a section 173 notice (Form RHW16). Two separate 6-month rules apply, and it's easy to mix them up:

Section 174 — minimum notice length: once you've validly served a section 173 notice, the leaving date you specify can't be less than 6 months after the day you served it. Section 174 is the timing rule attached to that one section 173 notice, not a second notice in its own right.
Section 175 — minimum contract age: you can't serve a section 173 notice at all until the contract has run for at least 6 months.

Beyond the two 6-month rules, a section 173 notice can still be invalidated by other bars: an outstanding compliance failure (missing EICR, alarms, deposit protection, written statement or gas safety check), an unregistered or unlicensed Rent Smart Wales status, an unlicensed HMO, serving again within 6 months of a previous notice, or serving in apparent retaliation for a complaint. (Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016, ss.173–177, 217)

Can I evict a contract-holder for not paying rent?

Yes, but the legal test for "seriously in arrears" is set in rent periods, never in cash. On a monthly contract — the near-universal case — that means at least 2 months' rent unpaid (8 weeks on a weekly/fortnightly/4-weekly contract, more than 3 months on a quarterly contract). There is no fixed pound-figure threshold anywhere in Welsh law, so don't rely on any "£X owed" rule of thumb you've seen elsewhere.

The ground is s.181 for a periodic contract or s.187 for a fixed-term one; the notice is served under s.182 or s.188 respectively, and both routes use the same form, RHW20. A possession claim can't be made within 14 days of serving the notice, or more than 6 months after it. If the case reaches court, the judge must order possession provided the arrears were serious both when notice was served and at the hearing itself — so a contract-holder who clears the arrears before the hearing date can defeat the claim. (Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016, ss.181, 182, 187, 188; Form RHW20, gov.wales)

Frequently asked questions

Do I still need to register with Rent Smart Wales if a licensed agent manages my property?

Yes, but only the registration, not the full landlord licence. Registration currently starts from £60 online; a self-managing landlord also needs the separate landlord licence on top (from £254 online), which a landlord using a Rent Smart Wales-licensed agent for all letting and management doesn't need — the agent carries that obligation instead. (Rent Smart Wales, Fee Policy, effective April 2025)

Can I still call it a "tenancy agreement"?

Informally, yes — most contract-holders, and most search engines, still say "tenancy" and "tenant." Legally, the document is a written statement of an occupation contract and the correct term for the other party is contract-holder. Use the legal terms in anything you'd rely on in court or with Rent Smart Wales.

Does my contract-holder have an automatic right to keep a pet?

No. There's no statutory right in Wales for a contract-holder to request a pet that a landlord can't unreasonably refuse — pets are only covered where you choose to include a pets clause as an optional additional term. A blanket "no pets" contract remains lawful in Wales; where a pets clause is included, refusal has to be reasonable under general contract-fairness rules. (Renting Homes (Model Written Statements of Contract) (Wales) Regulations 2022; gov.wales)

What if I never gave my contract-holder a written statement?

You can't validly serve a section 173 no-fault notice while it's outstanding, and you're exposed to a compensation claim from the contract-holder. Get a written statement issued as soon as you realise it's missing.

Do the same rules apply if I let an HMO?

Yes — an HMO letting in Wales is still a standard occupation contract, so the written statement, notice and fitness rules above all apply in the same way. On top of that, a property with 3 or more storeys, 5 or more occupants, forming 2 or more households, needs a mandatory HMO licence — and an unlicensed HMO can't have a valid section 173 notice served against it. (Licensing of HMOs (Prescribed Descriptions) (Wales) Order 2006; Housing Act 2004, s.75)

Where we come in

If you're self-managing and want a second opinion on your written statement, notice or arrears position, get in touch.

Every property we manage gets a fully compliant written statement from day one, and we track the notice and compliance-bar rules above so a section 173 notice doesn't fail on a technicality. Because we hold the Rent Smart Wales agent licence, landlords who use us for full management only need their own £60 registration, not the separate landlord licence — one practical reason to use a licensed agent rather than self-manage.

Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016: The Landlord's Guide to Occupation Contracts