Create a Rental Agreement Online for the UK: What It Must Include in 2026
TL;DR: If you create rental agreement online United Kingdom landlords need to know one thing before anything else: assured shorthold tenancies no longer exist for new lettings. The Renters' Rights Act 2025abolished ASTs and section 21 on 1 May 2026, and every new private tenancy in England is now an assured periodic tenancy. The Housing Act 1988 still governs, heavily amended. Any template still offering you an AST is describing a regime that ended.
Rising rental activity is keeping this a consistently high-volume search category in the UK through 2026. Almost every rental agreement template you will find online, and a great deal of the guidance around them, is now out of date, because the private rented sector in England changed fundamentally four months ago.
That change is the single most important thing this article can tell you, so it comes first.
What changed on 1 May 2026. The Renters' Rights Act 2025 abolished assured shorthold tenancies and section 21 "no fault" evictions in the private rented sector in England. Existing assured and assured shorthold tenancies converted automatically to assured periodic tenancies. Fixed terms ended. Every new private tenancy granted from that date is an assured tenancy, periodic from the outset. A landlord who served a valid section 21 notice before 1 May could still complete proceedings under it, with a window to bring the claim, but no new section 21 notice can be served.
Two qualifications. Section 21 abolition in the social rented sector follows later, so registered providers are not in the same position. And Wales has its own regime entirely under the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016, with occupation contracts and contract-holders rather than tenancies and tenants. This article describes England.
What a Compliant Rental Agreement Must Include Under the Housing Act 1988 and Tenancy Deposit Scheme Rules
The Housing Act 1988 remains the governing statute, as amended. What a compliant agreement contains has shifted with it.
The parties and the property, precisely identified. Full legal names, and a description of the premises leaving no doubt what is let, including whether parking, garden or storage is included.
The tenancy type, stated correctly. An assured periodic tenancy. Not an assured shorthold. Getting this wrong on the face of the document signals immediately that the agreement was produced from a pre-May 2026 template, and it will not create an AST however it is labelled.
The rent and the rent period. Amount, when it is due, and how it is paid. Rent increases now run through the statutory procedure rather than through whatever the agreement says, so a contractual rent review clause purporting to bypass it does not work.
The deposit, and its protection. Deposits remain governed by the Housing Act 2004. A deposit taken for an assured tenancy must be protected in an authorised tenancy deposit scheme, and the prescribed information served on the tenant within the statutory period. This obligation survived the reforms intact, and the penalties for missing it are among the harshest in residential landlord law.
Repairing obligations. The Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 implies repairing obligations that cannot be contracted out of in most residential lettings. An agreement purporting to put the structure and exterior on the tenant does not achieve that.
Grounds-based possession, understood. With section 21 gone, possession runs through the section 8 grounds in the Housing Act 1988 as amended. The agreement does not create those grounds and cannot expand them, but landlord and tenant should both understand that possession is now grounds-based in every case.
Access and notice. The landlord's right of entry, on proper notice and for stated purposes.
What happens at the end. Condition on return, removal of belongings, and how the deposit is dealt with through the scheme.
Prescribed documents. Compliance is not only the agreement. The gas safety certificate, energy performance certificate, the current How to Rent guide, and the deposit prescribed information all have to be served, and failures here have consequences for possession.
Stamp Duty Land Tax on qualifying leases
Most residential tenancies fall below the threshold, but SDLT is a real obligation on higher-value or longer leases, calculated on the net present value of the rent, and returns are filed with HMRC within the statutory period from the effective date. Commercial leases hit this far more often than residential ones. No generator calculates or files it for you.
Common Illegal Clauses to Avoid
Anything describing the tenancy as an assured shorthold, or reserving a section 21 right. Both were abolished on 1 May 2026. A clause purporting to preserve either is inaccurate and, at worst, misleads a tenant about their security.
A fixed term with no right to leave. Assured periodic tenancies do not have the old fixed-term structure. A clause locking a tenant in for twelve months does not reflect how these tenancies now work.
Blanket bans that the reforms addressed. The legislation restricts blanket refusals of tenants with children or on benefits, and improves the position on requests to keep a pet. Clauses drafted before the reforms routinely contain prohibitions that no longer stand.
Deposits above the statutory cap, or held outside a scheme. The Tenant Fees Act 2019 caps deposits and prohibits most other fees. Holding a deposit outside an authorised scheme is not a technicality: it exposes the landlord to a penalty of up to three times the deposit.
Prohibited fees dressed as charges. Administration fees, referencing fees, renewal fees and inventory charges are largely banned under the Tenant Fees Act 2019, whatever the agreement calls them.
Blanket exclusions of the landlord's liability. The Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 and, in consumer lettings, the Consumer Rights Act 2015 restrict exclusion clauses, and liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence cannot be excluded at all. The Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 repairing obligations cannot be excluded either.
Clauses allowing entry without notice, or re-entry without a court order. A landlord cannot lawfully evict without following the process. A clause claiming otherwise does not create the right and may itself be unlawful.
5 Steps to Generate One Online
Confirm which regime applies. England or Wales, residential or commercial, and whether the tenancy is one of the categories treated differently. This decision changes the entire document, and Welsh lettings need the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 framework instead.
Gather the facts. Parties, property, rent and rent period, deposit, repairing split, permitted occupiers, pets, and the prescribed documents you will serve.
Generate the agreement for England and Wales. Check the output describes an assured periodic tenancy. If the document produced calls itself an assured shorthold tenancy, it was drafted to the pre-May 2026 regime, and you should not use it as it stands.
Read it against the list above. Particularly the tenancy type, the deposit clause, anything about fixed terms or section 21, and the liability provisions.
Protect the deposit, serve the prescribed information and documents, and diarise everything. Deposit protection and prescribed information have statutory deadlines, and missing them affects both penalties and your ability to recover possession later.
Why so much online guidance is now wrong
It is worth understanding why this is a hard topic to research, because it will stay hard for a while.
Residential tenancy content is one of the most heavily produced categories on the UK internet, and almost all of it was written between 1988 and April 2026 against a regime that lasted nearly forty years. Assured shorthold tenancies and section 21 were so entrenched that they were treated as the permanent background rather than as one statutory scheme among possible others. Template libraries, blog posts, letting agent guidance and generator tools were all built on that assumption.
The result is that a search today returns a large volume of confident, well-written, obsolete material, and very little on the page signals its age. A tenancy agreement template written two years ago does not announce that its central premise has since expired.
The practical defence is to check the tenancy type first, before reading anything else. If a document, article or tool refers to an assured shorthold tenancy or a section 21 notice as a live option for a new private letting in England, it predates 1 May 2026 and everything else it says should be treated with the same suspicion.
FAQ
Do assured shorthold tenancies still exist?
Not for new private lettings in England. ASTs and section 21 were abolished on 1 May 2026 by the Renters' Rights Act 2025, and existing tenancies converted to assured periodic tenancies.
Can a landlord still use section 21?
No new section 21 notice can be served in the private rented sector. Possession now runs through the section 8 grounds in the Housing Act 1988 as amended.
Do I still have to protect the deposit?
Yes. Deposit protection under the Housing Act 2004 and the prescribed information requirements are unchanged, and the penalties remain severe.
Does any of this apply in Wales?
No. Wales operates the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 regime, with occupation contracts and contract-holders. Scotland and Northern Ireland are separate again.
Is Stamp Duty Land Tax payable on a tenancy?
Most residential tenancies fall below the threshold, but SDLT can apply to higher-value or longer leases, based on the net present value of the rent, and is filed with HMRC.
Key takeaways
ASTs and section 21 were abolished in England on 1 May 2026; new lettings are assured periodic tenancies.
The Housing Act 1988 still governs, as amended by the Renters' Rights Act 2025.
Deposit protection under the Housing Act 2004 and the Tenant Fees Act 2019 cap are unchanged.
Any template or generator offering you an AST is working from the pre-May 2026 regime.
Wales has a separate regime under the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 and is not covered by this.
Generate a compliant rental agreement with Ask.Legal for the UK
This article is general information about the law of England and Wales as at 2026, not legal advice. For advice on your circumstances, consult a qualified solicitor.