There have been a few stories about landlords writing to tenants about 50% rent increases from April 1st. Those landlords can get fucked on two counts. First, those rent increases are prohibited by the Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) Scotland Act 2022 — [as the Scottish Association of Landlords say](https://scottishlandlords.com/news-and-campaigns/news/rent-increases-after-31-march-2024/):
>Rent increase notices issued before 1 April are still subject to a 3% cap, even if the increase doesn’t come into force until after that date.
With the above news from the Scottish Government, those landlords can also get fucked. Although the 3% has been removed, it’s being replaced by a set of regulations that limit how much rent can be increased by. The max is 12% *but* that only applies in some circumstances. To quote the presser:
>The regulations would temporarily modify the rent adjudication process for 12 months so that on making a decision on adjudication, the rent officer would use a rent taper formula which can be summarised as below:
>* If the gap between the market rent and the current rent is 6% or less, then the landlord can increase the rent by the proposed amount, as long as this is not more than the market level.
>* If the gap between the market rent and the current rent is more than 6%, the landlord can increase the rent by 6% plus an additional 0.33% for each percent that the gap between the current rent and market rent exceeds 6%, as per the formula set out in the Rent Adjudication (Temporary Modifications) (Scotland) Regulations 2024. However, the total rent increase cannot exceed 12% of the current rent.
>* Both cases are also subject to the requirement that RSS and the FTT cannot set a higher rent than that requested by the landlord
E: I think for organisations like Living Rent, this isn’t as toothy as they’d like. A rent freeze, with some rents being forced down, and some rent increases being conditional on improvements to housing is their ideal, IIRC. But for tenants whose landlords were prematurely threatening to increase their rents by half or more, this is decent news.
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There have been a few stories about landlords writing to tenants about 50% rent increases from April 1st. Those landlords can get fucked on two counts. First, those rent increases are prohibited by the Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) Scotland Act 2022 — [as the Scottish Association of Landlords say](https://scottishlandlords.com/news-and-campaigns/news/rent-increases-after-31-march-2024/):
>Rent increase notices issued before 1 April are still subject to a 3% cap, even if the increase doesn’t come into force until after that date.
With the above news from the Scottish Government, those landlords can also get fucked. Although the 3% has been removed, it’s being replaced by a set of regulations that limit how much rent can be increased by. The max is 12% *but* that only applies in some circumstances. To quote the presser:
>The regulations would temporarily modify the rent adjudication process for 12 months so that on making a decision on adjudication, the rent officer would use a rent taper formula which can be summarised as below:
>* If the gap between the market rent and the current rent is 6% or less, then the landlord can increase the rent by the proposed amount, as long as this is not more than the market level.
>* If the gap between the market rent and the current rent is more than 6%, the landlord can increase the rent by 6% plus an additional 0.33% for each percent that the gap between the current rent and market rent exceeds 6%, as per the formula set out in the Rent Adjudication (Temporary Modifications) (Scotland) Regulations 2024. However, the total rent increase cannot exceed 12% of the current rent.
>* Both cases are also subject to the requirement that RSS and the FTT cannot set a higher rent than that requested by the landlord
E: I think for organisations like Living Rent, this isn’t as toothy as they’d like. A rent freeze, with some rents being forced down, and some rent increases being conditional on improvements to housing is their ideal, IIRC. But for tenants whose landlords were prematurely threatening to increase their rents by half or more, this is decent news.