Property Manager’s Guide to Deed of Assignment

A new academic year is about to begin, meaning student property managers are gearing up for the next lettings season. Student groups can be quite volatile as tenants can need to drop out of tenancies for a variety of reasons, be it semesters on placement, taking time out of university, deferring a year, or even disagreements amongst housemates. To support this, you may need to issue tenancy amendments using a Deed of Assignment.

This guide explains everything you need to know about Deeds of Assignment, including what they are, why you might need to use them, what you should do before accepting a replacement tenant, and how to issue one. 

What is a Deed of Assignment?

A Deed of Assignment is an amendment to a tenancy contract that allows you to replace one or more tenants without cancelling the original contract. A Deed of Assignment can be issued for a fully signed tenancy agreement when the tenancy is not in the process of being replaced or cancelled. 

Why would you need to use a Deed of Assignment?

When property managers are letting HMOs (houses in multiple occupation), it is common to let to large groups of tenants, assigning each their own room and rent schedule. If a tenant then decides to leave the tenancy after signing, it can be very inefficient to cancel the existing contract and write an entirely new one for the new or remaining tenants. 

When only one tenant (or a few tenants within a group) wants to leave the tenancy but the rest of the tenants living in the property want to stay, you can issue a Deed of Assignment. This can save you a lot of time and administrative hassle as you only need to issue an amendment with the replacement tenant details and the effective date when outgoing and replacement tenants will exchange liability for the property.

For PBSA operators, you are able to issue a deed of assignment for single tenant tenancies. Tenants may need to leave their tenancy for a variety of reasons regardless of how many others they live with, and wish to assign the remainder of their tenancy to another student. The process works in exactly the same way. All you need are the replacement tenant details and the effective date.

What should you do before accepting a replacement tenant?

Before you allow a new tenant to move into your property to replace someone outgoing, you need to check that they will be appropriate. Follow these key steps.

Make sure remaining tenants are happy with the replacement tenant

The tenants who are remaining in the property will have to live with whoever comes in as a replacement so it is important to make sure that they all feel comfortable and happy with the choice of new tenant. Depending on the circumstances, it might be appropriate to ask the remaining tenants to source a replacement tenant themself, which could alleviate potential difficulties. If this is the case, you will still need to carry out thorough reference checks on the suggested tenant. 

Carry out references and credit checks

Before you issue a Deed of Assignment, you should carry out reference and credit checks to establish that the tenant can afford the rent and will be reliable. If you are letting a student property, the incoming tenant may not be able to provide suitable employment verification, so it might be advisable to ask them to provide a guarantor or use a guarantor service 

You should also ensure that the suggested incoming tenant has the right to rent in the UK. 

Get their signature

Of course, before a tenant can move into the property, you will need to provide them with the existing tenancy agreement so they can review the terms. You will then need them to sign the Deed of Assignment along with the outgoing tenant and the remaining tenants. 

Keep records

Make sure that you keep thorough records of everything involved with the Deed of Assignment, including the original tenancy agreement, the Deed (signed by all parties), and any communications relating to the amendment. 

How to create a Deed of Assignment with Concurrent 

Concurrent makes it extremely easy to manage joint liable contracts. Our software was originally developed for the HMO market, meaning that we designed our digital contract signing solution to allow you to set up different rent schedules and requirements within one contract. For single-tenant contracts, it is just as easy. 

If a tenant then chooses to leave the tenancy, Concurrent has a built-in Deed of Assignment feature that allows you to cancel and rewrite the contract in just five clicks. The system’s automations save you time and hassle. 

To create a Deed of Assignment with Concurrent, follow these simple steps:

• Set the effective date: the date that you want the Deed of Assignment to come into effect. This will be when the outgoing and replacement tenants exchange liability for the property.
• Select which of the current tenants will be remaining and which will be outgoing.
• Review and adjust ‘tenant type’, ‘Right to Rent check’ and ‘guarantor requirement’ for the replacement tenant.
• Facilitate any necessary payments to or from the outgoing tenant through the Concurrent system. If there is a total owed to the tenant, the outgoing tenant will be required to enter their bank account details when signing the Deed of Assignment. If there is a total due from the tenant, the tenant will be required to make a payment when signing the Deed of Assignment.
• Specify whether the replacement tenant will need to pay a deposit or fee during the signing process

The rent schedule, including amount and frequency, will be the same as the one currently used for the outgoing tenant. You can edit this if necessary. 



Make replacement tenancies simple with Concurrent 

As you get ready for a new lettings season, why not use Concurrent to make contract signing and tenancy management easier than ever before? Book a demo today to trial the solution’s impressive capabilities.