Renew your business lease

Part 2 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 protects a tenancy where you occupy the premises for your business. When the lease reaches its end date it does not end. It carries on on the same terms until it is ended in one of the ways the Act allows, and you can ask for a new lease.

Leases without the right to renew

You do not have the right to renew if:

• you have a farm business tenancy or a tenancy of an agricultural holding
• you have a mining lease
• your tenancy was granted because of your job and ends when the job ends
• your lease is for a fixed term of 6 months or less, unless it can be renewed or extended beyond 6 months, or you and anyone you took the business over from have been in occupation for more than 12 months
• you agreed to contract out before the lease was granted

You do not have the right if you are breaking a ban in your lease on using the premises for business, unless your landlord consented to it or accepted it.

If your landlord serves notice

Your landlord can end a protected tenancy only by giving you a notice in the prescribed form. It must be given between 6 and 12 months before the date it names, and that date cannot be earlier than the date the lease would otherwise have ended. The notice must say whether the landlord opposes a new tenancy. If they do, it must state their grounds. If they do not, it must set out their proposals for the premises, rent and other terms of the new lease.

If you want to ask for a new lease

If your lease was granted for a fixed term of more than one year, you can start the process yourself with a request for a new tenancy in the prescribed form. The new lease must start between 6 and 12 months after your request, and not before your lease would otherwise have ended. Set out the premises, rent and other terms you propose. You cannot make a request if your landlord has already served notice, or if you have given notice to quit.

Your landlord then has two months to tell you if they will oppose a new tenancy, and on which grounds.

Agree the terms or apply to court

Most renewals are agreed by negotiation. If you cannot agree, you or your landlord can apply to court for a new tenancy. You must apply before the date in the landlord's notice, or before the start date in your request. You and your landlord can agree to extend that deadline, but you must agree before it passes. If you made a request, you cannot apply in the first two months unless your landlord has already said they will oppose it.

If you apply in time, your tenancy carries on until 3 months after the court case is finally decided. If you miss the deadline, you lose the right to a new lease under the Act.

Grounds your landlord can rely on

Your landlord can oppose a new lease only on the grounds in section 30 of the Act. They cannot rely on the ground that they want to occupy the premises themselves if they bought their interest within the 5 years before your tenancy ends, and the premises have been let to business tenants throughout that time.

Compensation if you have to leave

If you cannot get a new lease only because the landlord wants to demolish or rebuild, to occupy the premises, or to let the whole property as one unit, you can claim compensation when you leave. It is based on the rateable value of the premises, and is doubled if the premises have been used for a business for the whole of the 14 years before the tenancy ends, with any change of occupier being a successor to the same business.