UK Landlord Forum / Life

Hi, myself and my boyfriend have been living in our rented estate cottage now for 3 years. We signed a fixed term 24 month initial contract and when this came up for renewal we asked the landlord to draw up another 24 month contract. They did this and they signed it. However, we did not for no other reason other than we forgot. We are now 12 months in to this new contract.

Due to personal changes in our circumstances we now wish to move out of the area completely due to a job move and have viewed a property on a Country Estate that will be shortly sending us an application form. The letting agents will be requesting a reference from our existing landlords in the not too distant future and if we are accepted we want to give one months notice on the properety we rent at the moment.

Even though we did not sign and hand back the AST is this still legally binding? We do understand that if it is, then we will have to try to come to a mutual agreement with our landlord to terminate the contract early. However, we would like to know our rights given that we did not sign the contract. Does anyone have any ideal how we legally stand and if the answer is that we have to either pay the next years rent then what can we do to persuade the existing landlord to agree to finishing the contract early.

Any information gratefully received.