How to Raise Rent Legally: Section 13 Notice and Form 4A Explained

What changed under the Renters' Rights Act 2025

All rent increases on assured periodic tenancies must now go through the Section 13 process using Form 4A. Informal rent rises and old fixed-term rent-review clauses no longer have any legal effect. Minimum notice is 2 months, and rent can only rise once every 12 months. Read the full guide.

Since 1 May 2026, every assured tenancy in the private rented sector in England is a periodic tenancy, and there is only one lawful route to increase the rent on one: serve a valid notice under section 13 of the Housing Act 1988, using the current prescribed form, Form 4A. This guide walks through exactly how to do that — when you're allowed to increase rent, how to complete Form 4A field by field, how much notice to give, how to serve it, and what happens if your tenant disputes the new figure at the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber).

Why the process changed

Before 1 May 2026, many assured shorthold tenancies increased rent informally — a rent-review clause in the fixed-term agreement, or a simple written agreement between landlord and tenant. The Renters' Rights Act 2025 closed that route off. Section 6 of the Act rewrote section 13 of the Housing Act 1988 so that the rent payable under an assured tenancy cannot be greater than the rent for the previous period except by virtue of a valid Section 13 notice, a tribunal determination, or a written agreement following a tribunal determination. Any tenancy term that tries to let rent increase in some other way — including an old rent-review clause carried over from a fixed-term AST — simply has no effect.

In practice, this means:

• Rent-review clauses in old tenancy agreements no longer work. Even if your tenancy agreement has a clause allowing an annual increase by a set percentage or index, you cannot rely on it. You have to serve a Form 4A notice.
• You cannot agree an increase informally, even if your tenant is happy to pay more and puts it in writing to you directly, outside the Section 13 process.
• Every increase, no matter how small or how amicable, goes through Form 4A. There is no exemption for landlords and tenants who are on good terms.

When you can — and cannot — increase the rent

Section 13(2) of the Housing Act 1988, as amended, sets three requirements for the date a new rent can start. All three must be satisfied:

1. At least two months after you serve the notice. This replaced the old rules (which varied by tenancy type — commonly one month or six months) with a single two-month minimum for every assured tenancy in the private rented sector.
2. Not within the first 52 weeks of the tenancy. You cannot increase the rent at all during a tenancy's first year.
3. Not within 52 weeks of the last increase (occasionally 53 weeks — see below), if this isn't the first increase.
4. At the start of a tenancy period. If the tenancy runs calendar month to calendar month starting on the 20th, the new rent has to start on a 20th. If it's a weekly tenancy that started on a Monday, the new rent has to start on a Monday.

The 52/53-week rule, explained

The 52-week gap is designed to stop rent increase dates creeping earlier every year, since 52 weeks is a few days short of a calendar year. If the 53rd week after your last increase would begin more than six days before the anniversary of your very first increase (the first one made after 11 February 2003), you must wait the extra week — 53 weeks instead of 52 — before increasing again. This is a technical point most landlords will never need to calculate manually, but it's why Form 4A asks for the date of your first increase after 11 February 2003 as well as your most recent one.

Completing Form 4A: a field-by-field walkthrough

Form 4A — "Landlord's notice proposing a new rent for assured tenancies in the private rented sector" — is the current prescribed form under section 13(2) of the Housing Act 1988, for use in England only. It has five main sections:

1. The tenant's details — name(s) of every tenant (all joint tenants, if more than one) and the address of the let property.

2. The landlord's details — your name and a contact address where the tenant can reach someone about the increase. A phone number and email address are recommended but optional; note that if you do provide an email address, you're agreeing that the tenant and the tribunal may use it to serve documents on you.

3. The agent's details (if applicable) — the same information, for a letting agent acting on your behalf.

4. The rent — this is the substantive section:

• 4.1 Current rent and how often it's paid (the tenancy period — must be a month or less).
• 4.2 The date the tenancy started.
• 4.3 The date of the most recent rent increase, if any (leave blank if there hasn't been one).
• 4.4 The date of the first rent increase after 11 February 2003, if any — this is what determines whether the 52- or 53-week rule applies.
• 4.5 The proposed new rent and its frequency.
• 4.6 The date the new rent will start — this must satisfy the three requirements set out above.
• 4.7 Any charges (council tax, water, electricity/gas/other fuel, communication services, fixed service charges) currently and newly included within the rent figure itself, where the tenant doesn't pay these separately.

5. Signature — signed and dated by you (or every joint landlord, or one landlord with the others' agreement).

Form 4A also includes a built-in information section for the tenant explaining their right to challenge the notice, and prescribed guidance notes on the timing rules. You must use the current version of the form as published on GOV.UK and can't alter its wording beyond what it permits, or the notice may not be valid.

How much notice you must give

The minimum notice period for a Section 13 rent increase is two months, running from the date you serve the notice to the date the new rent starts. This is a hard floor, not a target — serving with exactly two months' notice is valid, but serving with less is not, and the tenant can challenge the validity of a notice that falls short.

If your tenant disputes the increase: the First-tier Tribunal

A tenant who thinks your proposed rent is above the open market rate — or who thinks the notice itself isn't valid — can apply to the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) for a determination. They must do this before the start date you gave in question 4.6 of the form; if they miss that deadline without agreeing a variation with you, the rent in your notice simply takes effect.

What the tribunal actually decides:

• It determines the open market rent — what you could reasonably expect the property to let for on the open market, on the same terms, taking into account factors like the property's condition.
• It cannot make the tenant pay more than you proposed. Under section 14ZB of the Housing Act 1988 (inserted by the Renters' Rights Act 2025), if the tribunal's open-market figure is lower than your proposed rent, the lower figure becomes payable; if the tribunal's figure is higher, your originally proposed rent still applies. There's no downside for a tenant in applying, and no upside for a landlord in low-balling a rent hoping the tribunal will raise it.
• It can also rule on whether your notice was valid — for example, whether you gave at least two months' notice, whether the increase respects the 52-week gap, or whether the form itself was correctly completed. If the tribunal finds the notice invalid, it doesn't go on to determine a rent at all, and the tenant doesn't have to pay the proposed increase.
• The current application fee is £47 (correct as at July 2026 — check GOV.UK for the current fee), unless the notice is dated before 1 May 2026 or the tenant is in social housing. Fee reductions may be available for tenants on low incomes or certain benefits.
• GOV.UK does not publish a fixed processing timeline for these applications — many cases are decided on paperwork alone, without a hearing, but the tribunal will tell the parties if an inspection or hearing is needed. Don't rely on a specific number of weeks; check the current position with the tribunal or GOV.UK guidance if timing matters to your situation.

Serving the notice

Check your written tenancy agreement first: if it specifies an agreed method of service (which may include email), use that method. If it doesn't specify a method, GOV.UK guidance says you can serve Form 4A by:

• handing it to the tenant in person,
• leaving it at the tenant's address, or
• sending it by registered post.

Keep evidence that you served the notice and when — this matters if the tenant later disputes the notice's validity or the two-month notice period.

What you cannot do

• You cannot rely on an informal agreement or a rent-review clause instead of Form 4A. Under section 13(4A) of the Housing Act 1988 (as amended), any tenancy provision that would let the rent increase some other way simply has no effect.
• You cannot increase the rent more than once every 12 months (52/53 weeks).
• You cannot increase the rent at all in the tenancy's first 52 weeks.
• You cannot give less than two months' notice.
• You cannot start the new rent partway through a tenancy period — it must begin at the start of a new period.
• You cannot rely on Form 4 for a privately rented property — Form 4 is now reserved for social housing assured tenancies only; the correct form for the private rented sector is Form 4A.

A note on scope

This guide covers assured periodic tenancies in the private rented sector in England, following the Renters' Rights Act 2025's abolition of assured shorthold tenancies and Section 21 on 1 May 2026. Rules differ in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and social housing assured tenancies follow a separate timetable and use different forms (Form 4, not Form 4A) — check GOV.UK if either applies to you. If you gave a tenant notice of a rent increase using Form 4 before 1 May 2026, that notice and its terms still stand even if the new rent starts after that date.

For the document itself, see our Section 13 Notice — Rent Increase page, and for a closer look at the legislation behind the form, see Tenancy Form 4A: Landlord's Notice Proposing New Rent. For the wider set of changes introduced by the Act, see our Renters' Rights Act 2025 hub.

Not legal advice

This article explains the current law as set out in the Housing Act 1988 (as amended by the Renters' Rights Act 2025) and current GOV.UK guidance; it is provided for general information only and does not constitute legal advice. TenancyAgreementService.co.uk is a legal information and document publication, not a firm of solicitors, and this content is written from a non-practising solicitor's perspective. For advice on your specific circumstances, consult a practising solicitor, Citizens Advice, a local law centre, or GOV.UK's own landlord guidance.