Here is a question to the blog clinic from Marjorie (not her real name) who is a landlord.
I want to have my property valued. I have asked my tenant to let me know when it would be convenient to have an agent visit to do this. She does not respond.
Am I within my rights to give her notice of when I want to have the valuation done and go ahead and let myself into the premises?
I don’t want to do this and would much prefer to have an amicable agreement with her. But would also like to know if I can force the issue if she doesn’t respond or co-operate.
Answer
First you need to check your tenancy agreement to see what it says about visits and inspection visits.
Most likely it will provide for inspection visits for viewing the condition of the property but not for visits for valuation purposes. This will mean that you do not have any legal right to access for this purpose.
Once you rent a property to a tenant, you lose most of your rights in respect of it (other than the right to receive rent and get the property back at the end of the tenancy). So far as access rights are concerned, you can only really go in without getting the tenants agreement first, in case of real emergency, for example if it is on fire.
Even if your tenancy agreement provides for access for the reason you require access (in this case for valuation purposes) you can’t just go in whenever you want.
If you were to go in without your tenants prior agreement for example, this could render you liable for prosecution for harassment and also for a claim for compensation for breach of the ‘covenant for quiet enjoyment’.
It is only fair to say that the landlords right to go in when authorized by the tenancy agreement but not the tenant, is a hotly contested issue and we had a long discussion about it here.
However notwithstanding some of the views expressed in the comments to that post, I am strongly of the view that a landlord would be MOST unwise to ever enter a property (save in emergency) without the tenants express permission.
This is even more important in your case as I suspect your tenancy agreement does not authorize this type of inspection visit.
In which case if you cannot persuade your tenant to allow access, you will need to either wait until she has vacated the property or see if the valuer can provide a valuation from viewing the property from outside.