The law protects you against being stuck with a bad tenant. Your tenant must pay his rent promptly, take care of your property and avoid causing a nuisance to his neighbours or using the property for illegal or immoral purposes. He must obey any rules of the tenancy agreement, such as not keeping pets or taking in lodgers. If he does not, he will probably lose his home.

It is worth taking precautions against bad tenants. If you have followed the advice in 'Getting a Tenant' you will have a properly drawn up tenancy agreement and possibly also a deposit. It is particularly important to have a written tenancy agreement to end the tenancy on 'bad tenant' grounds which are specified in the agreement between you and your tenant. Make sure your agreement is clear about what will happen if the tenant does not keep his side of the bargain.

Rent arrears should be tackled as soon as they arise. Your agreement should provide for rent to be paid regularly on a particular day of the week, month or year. If a payment is missed, notify the tenant straightaway and ask him for the money. If there are serious rent arrears, then the law enables you to get your property back. You can get it back in the following circumstances:

• If there are very serious rent arrears - 8 weeks' rent in the case of a tenancy for which rent is payable weekly and 2 months rent where the rent is payable monthly - you can apply to the court for possession and the court must grant you possession if the arrears are still outstanding. It will also normally order the tenant to pay off his arrears.
• If the tenant has persistently delayed paying his rent, or if rent was owing when you gave the tenant notice of your intention to take proceedings for possession against him and was still owing when those proceedings started, then the court may grant you possession. The court may also in these circumstances grant you a suspended order of possession - the tenant will only have to leave if he does not pay off his arrears as ordered by the court.

Potential landlords are sometimes afraid that any tenants they might take may damage their property or furniture, or be bad neighbours. You can, however, control this since the law allows you to get the property back if the tenant damages it or your furniture, or if he is a nuisance to neighbours. If your tenant is convicted of using the property for illegal purposes, or immoral acts, you may have him evicted as well. You can also ask the court to grant you possession if the tenant has broken any other obligation of his tenancy agreement.

If you are letting on a fixed term contract, you will only be able to use these 'bad tenant' grounds for possession during the fixed term if the agreement says that you can. So make sure your agreement is clear on these points.

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