From December 1, every new private tenancy will be a private residential tenancy. We told you about the benefits to tenants, but we worked with landlords and other representative bodies to make sure we took their interests into account when we developed the new tenancy.

As a result, the new tenancy has benefits for landlords too. One is simplicity. Setting up a new tenancy involves less paperwork. You won’t have to issue AT5 or AT7 forms to tenants before they sign their lease, and you can use our recommended model tenancy agreement, which we’ll make available digitally. This has a mix of mandatory and discretionary terms, to make it easy for you to tailor for your own needs and meet your legal obligation to provide your tenant with all the written terms of their tenancy.

It will be simpler to end tenancies too. While new tenancies will have no end date, we’ve set out 18 grounds for repossession, including a new grounds where you intend to sell the property and where the property has been abandoned. We’ve simplified the paperwork at this end of the tenancy too. Rather than completing ‘notice to quit’ and ‘notice of proceedings’ forms, you’ll only need one notice called a ‘notice to leave’.

There are other changes that will benefit landlords (for example if your tenant is in rent arrears, you can refer a case for repossession more quickly). You can read more detail about these in our landlords guide to private residential tenancies.

Remember, though, that the new tenancy won’t affect existing leases. These will carry on until either you or your tenant brings it to an end by serving notice to quit the let property. Remember too that all landlords in Scotland must be registered with the council before they can let a property.