The Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) (Scotland) Act 2022
What you need to know.
The Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) (Scotland) Act 2022 was first introduced in October 2022 to help tenants who were struggling with the cost-of-living crisis. This meant enforcing a rent freeze and eviction ban.
The Scottish government has recently announced its plans to extend the eviction ban and enforce a rent cap of 3% (subject to 12 months) from April 2023 and these changes will be in place for 6 months until September 2023.
The change to the act is still subject to the Parliament’s approval.
Landlords can apply for a higher increase of 6%
With the rent cap at 3%, Landlords can however apply for a higher increase of 6% on the basis of increased property costs but this is dependent on “defined and limited circumstances”.
The Scottish Government has also announced that the rent cap only applies to the privately rented sector. The rent freeze will no longer apply to the social housing sector as of 26th February 2023 and suspend the rent cap on student accommodation as the government feels they have a limited impact on annual rents.
Rent Freeze and Eviction ban do not include Social Housing or Student Accommodation.
Tenants’ rights minister, Patrick Harvie has said:
“Our emergency legislation has helped protect tenants facing the cost of living crisis. With many households still struggling with bills, it is clear that these protections are still needed to give tenants greater confidence about their housing costs and the security of a stable home.
While the primary purpose of the legislation is to support tenants, I recognise that costs have been rising for landlords too. That’s why we intend to allow those in the private sector to increase rents by up to 3%, with a continued safeguard allowing them to apply for larger increases to cover specified rising costs they might be seeing as landlords. By allowing increases in rent – capped well below inflation and limited to once per 12 months – we can continue protecting tenants from the minority of landlords who would impose unaffordable rent hikes.
We will continue to carefully monitor the impacts of this legislation, working with tenants and landlords to protect them from this costs crisis.”
We will be continuously monitoring legislation.
For more information, please visit the Scottish Government website below:
https://www.gov.scot/publications/cost-of-living-rent-and-eviction/pages/introduction/