Call of the month: Belongings left behind - what do I do?

A member recently called our advice team with a question about what to do with belongings left behind by a tenant who had moved out?

The landlord said that the goods that had been left at the end of the tenancy were mainly clothes and bric-a-brac of modest value and were dotted around the property. The implication was the tenant had no interest in taking them, but nothing had been said. 

This is a common reason for calls to the advice team and there are a few courses of action open to the landlord, depending on the wording of the agreement.

Speak to the tenant

The first and easiest course of action should be to speak to the tenant, especially if any expensive or potentially sentimental items have been left.

Read the tenancy agreement

The next course of action is to read the tenancy agreement. If it contains a clause that directly addresses the issue of goods being left and is fairly worded, then a landlord is free to follow the clause to resolve the issue. The clause included in the NRLA agreement, for example, outlines what will happen to goods at the end of the tenancy if they are not taken away by the tenant.

Goods can be removed, stored, sold, or otherwise disposed of after a 'reasonable period of time' which is currently set at 14 days following the end of the tenancy. Landlords also have the right to get rid of any perishable goods - such as food that might be going off.

In addition to this the landlord can also recover 'reasonable' storage costs either by selling the goods, or claiming the costs from the tenant. 

What if there is no clause in the tenancy agreement about this?

If there is no clause, then a landlord should instead give the tenants reasonable notice of their intention to sell the goods, or to impose an obligation on the tenant to collect them. If it is not worth selling the good they can simply be thrown away.

Often, these notices are combined together into one letter giving at least 28 days’ notice to the tenant. Landlords are advised to make every effort try to contact the tenant in the meantime, to inform them such a notice has been served.

In this instance, our member had used an NRLA AST for the tenancy, and were able to make use of the clause.

We recommended trying to contact the tenant a couple of times during the 14 days, using any email addresses or contact numbers they had, as well as any emergency contacts or guarantors, to try to arrange for the goods to be collected. This way the could prove they had made every effort to contact the tenant.

If they could not contact the tenant, then following the clause, they had the right to dispose of the goods.

• To read more about this topic, check out our new guide for landlords here.