UK Landlord Forum / Life

I am a new Landlord about to rent my first property and have paid an on line solicitors for an AST contract in which I can fill the dates and party details out myself.

I have a clause in the contract which prohibits any naked flames at the property.  My prospective tenant questioned this as they are a big fan of scented candles.  Is it reasonable to have this clause in (the fitted hob and oven are electric) ?

What do others have in their contracts (if anything) regarding naked flames ?

Thanks

Hi Martha,

Just looked through my AST's, and none of them have anything about naked flames. Seems a bit stupid to me, and I'm not even sure a clause like that could be enforceable. Because to say you can't use candles is quite unreasonable, especially if there's a powercut. Not to mention, landlords can't even force tenants not to smoke...

Same response as I offered in my previous reply.

Will you start a new thread for each clause you want a view on, or is it possible to collate them into a short list? 

How long is this AST you've purchased?

I would contemplate starting a new document and creating your own, taking only the bits you want... and useful bits from others that you can find on the Internet. I created my own because I wanted to put the effort into writing it out (in clear English as well) and having a really good grasp of what it contained. Top marks to you for actually reading your AST and questioning some things... other Landlords just take something off the shelf and reckon "that'll do". 

Yeah, agreed.

In reality, the solicitor probably didn't draw you up a new, bespoke AST. They probably just got one out of the filing cabinet and sent you a copy, hence why it's filled with such nonsense! Hope you didn't pay too much for it!!

Thank's all for your replies.

Hippogriff - dont worry - I dont intend to raise a topic for every AST clause 
Just about done now

Thanks

My AST is 9 pages long. That's with a cover. An AST I assisted another forum member with a while ago came out at 10 pages, with a cover page and a bit of conscious duplication of some key Tenant obligations.

I've seen good ones as short as 4 pages and as long as 13... below that page count and I'd be worried it wasn't comprehensive and above that page count I'd start to aggressively look for things to trim and simplify.