Tenancy agreement
Your Tenancy
We offer the following type of tenancies, which are all covered by tenancy agreements. A Tenancy Agreement is a very important legal contract, which you should keep safe. It tells you all about your rights and responsibilities as a tenant and the rights and responsibilities of Derwentside Homes, your landlord.- Transferring Assured Tenancies
- Assured Shorthold (Starter) Tenancies
- Assured Tenancies
- Demoted Tenancies
Download our Tenancy AgreementTransferring Assured Tenancy
If you were a tenant of Derwentside District Council at the time of the transfer (4th December 2006) and you are still a tenant, you have protected rights that existed at the time of the transfer. Download our Transferring Tenancy Agreement
Assured Shorthold (Starter) Tenancy
If you did not have a tenancy with the council when the council housing transferred to us, we will give you an assured short hold tenancy agreement. The agreement lasts for 12 months. If there have not been any problems with the tenancy, it will automatically become an assured tenancy after those 12 months.If you break the tenancy conditions, we will apply to the court to evict you. This could be due to unpaid rent, nuisance problems, moving out of the property without telling us, or neglecting the property.
Assured Tenancy
This is a standard tenancy agreement. It allows you to stay in your home for as long as you want, as long as you keep to the conditions of the tenancy agreement. We will give assured tenancy agreements to new tenants who have held an assured short hold agreement with us for 12 months, unless they have broken the tenancy conditions. We will end a tenancy only if you have broken the tenancy conditions or if essential maintenance is needed and it would be unsafe for you to stay in the property.Joint Tenancies
We will grant joint tenancies unless you tell us otherwise. A joint tenancy is where the tenancy is under two or more names. With a joint tenancy, all tenants are responsible for all parts of the tenancy (for example, paying the rent or making sure visitors do not create a nuisance). This means that if one tenant breaks a tenancy condition, we can also hold the other tenants responsible.Demoted Tenancies
Should an Assured Tenant cause anti social behaviour, the Anti Social Behaviour Act 2003 enables us to demote assured tenancies to assured shorthold tenancies for a period of 12 months. At any time during this period of demotion the tenancy can be brought to an end. If no action is taken during the demotion period the tenancy will become a fully Assured Tenancy after 12 months.For further information please refer to your Tenancy Agreement or speak to our Customer Service Team on 08458 505 600 or 0800 783 9295.
