When is a landlord on safe grounds to give a tenant with signed lease a notice to quit?

WE ARE grateful to Kevin Baneham of Threshold and Igor Fleming of LMF Property Management Design Consultancy for pointing out an error in an answer in last week’s QA column and helping to considerably clarify the matter.

The scenario raised in the question was that the tenants are four months into a fixed-term contract for a year and that the landlord has served a “notice to quit” on the grounds that the landlord’s daughter wishes to move into the apartment. Our answer stated that the landlord is entitled to regain possession of the apartment, despite the fixed-term lease, because his daughter requires it for her use. This is incorrect.

It is correct to say that a landlord can terminate a “Part 4” tenancy on the grounds that his daughter requires the accommodation for her use, but only where there is no fixed term lease in place.

The tenants in question have the benefit of “Part 4” security of tenure because they have lived in the apartment for two years.

The landlord, however, cannot avail of these grounds to terminate a tenancy where there is a fixed term lease in place.

The security of tenure provided in “Part 4” of the Residential Tenancies Act is a minimum level of security of tenure and not a maximum level.

“Part 4” would be a maximum level of security of tenure if a landlord was able to use the grounds listed in section 34 to end every tenancy, even those where the landlord had committed to a fixed-term lease agreement. Kevin Baneham also suggests that tenants verify any notice is valid and compliant with the requirements of the Residential Tenancies Act. The Act refers to notices of termination and not notices to quit, so it is quite likely that a notice entitled a “notice to quit” will be invalid.