Auction sale of let property- problems re tenant/rent

[barney2]

Hi all. In May I sold a property at auction with a six month AST (with 4 months remaining). A week after the sale my tenant gave me 1 months notice as is his right. Last week I queried with my solicitor why the transaction was taking so long and he now advises me that the buyer is requesting 4 months rent from me as the property will no longer be tenanted or will sue me for breach of contract if I don\'t pay up. Surely he can\'t do this as I had no control over whether my tenant stayed for the remainder of the tenancy. I only made about £5,000 on the sale of this property so am reluctant to hand over almost £1,500 in rent to the buyer. Any advice would be appreciated. (I know my solicitor should be advising me but I don\'t think he has come across this before and frankly I am fed up with his dithering and need to conclude this sale!!).

[Jonboy]

if the buyer bought with 4 months remaining, then he thinks he is entitled to the money, but he needs to be reminded that he also bought with the ast and all it's clauses! if that includes the right to terminate then that is what he bought, so tough!

on the other hand

if the tenant has only been in 2 months, surely he does not have the right to one months notice at this early stage? in which case you are letting the tenant go and would owe the new purchaser the rent.

[barney2]

Thanks for replying so promptly. The tenant was already in the property when I purchased it 3 months prior to the auction sale. He had an AST with the previous owner which had expired. I am hoping the new buyer is just trying it on (she is an experienced landlord and owns about a dozen properties in this location) as, as mentioned in my original post, I cannot afford to pay her out of my meagre profit on this property!

[P.Pilcher]

At auction the property was presumably described by the auctioneers as having a tenant in residence on a 6 month AST with 4 months remaining.
Normally such an AST will have a fixed period of 6 months - i.e. he tenant cannot leave the property before the 6 month period has expired. If he wants to for whatever reason then the landlord has to find a suitable replacement as quickly as possible and the original tenant is liable for the rental until the new tenant is in place or for the remainder of the six month period whichever period is shorter. Said tenant is also liable for the reasonable costs of finding a suitable new tenant provided this is still less than the remainder of the six months rent outstanding.

This would be the reasonable assumption of your purchaser, unless a copy of your AST was included in the legal pack indicating that it permitted your tenant to leave at any time on giving one month's notice, or your purchaser was informed of this fact in some other way before making her successful bid.
As your purchaser is making the claims she is then it would appear that she is unaware of this....... unless your AST included no such clause and you wrongly assumed that all your tenant had to give was one month's notice at any time to leave.

These are the facts as I see them and it will be up to you and your solicitor how to proceed. If your tenant had given notice which you had accepted and this was made clear before the auction commenced to the bidders in some way, then your purchaser hasn't a leg to stand on.

Best of luck,

P.P.