Register or Lose Possession: What the Landlord Database Means for East Midlands Landlords

The Government will open its Register your rental property service this winter, region by region, and landlords with property in the East Midlands will have from 15 February to 14 May 2027 to comply. There is an annual fee of £65 for each property, which is the least interesting thing about it. The consequence of not registering is that you will not be able to recover possession of your own property.

What is being introduced

The private rented sector database is created by Part 2, Chapter 3 of the Renters' Rights Act 2025, at sections 75 to 96. Every landlord letting under an assured or a regulated tenancy must register themselves and each dwelling they let. Supported exempt accommodation within the meaning of the Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act 2023 sits outside it.

The service is being rolled out region by region rather than all at once, and each region has a three month window in which to register. The West Midlands goes first, opening on 15 December 2026, and London does not open until 15 July 2027. The £65 fee is payable for each property and renewable every year, pro rated during the rollout.

The East Midlands dates, and a trap for portfolios

For property in the East Midlands the regulations come into force on 15 February 2027, and registration must be completed by 14 May 2027.

The detail that catches people is that the deadline follows the property, not the landlord. A landlord living in Nottingham who also owns two flats in Leeds and one in Birmingham has three different deadlines: Birmingham from 15 December 2026, Nottingham from 15 February 2027, and Leeds from 15 April 2027. Anyone holding stock across regional boundaries should be drawing up that schedule now, because a portfolio does not register itself in one sitting.

The sanction nobody is discussing

Most of the commentary so far has concentrated on the fee and the deadline. The provision that matters is section 90, which restricts the recovery of possession. A landlord in breach of the duty to register will not be able to obtain a possession order, and the only exception is where possession is sought on anti social behaviour grounds.

Consider what that means in practice. A landlord with a tenant in serious arrears, or one who needs the property back in order to sell it or to live in it, will find the door closed until registration is in order. Section 21 has gone, the statutory grounds are now the only route, and registration has become the key to that route. It is worth saying plainly: an unregistered landlord is, for most purposes, a landlord who cannot get their property back.

Marketing and letting before registration

Section 82 restricts the marketing, advertising and letting of a dwelling that is not registered. A landlord who lets or advertises an unregistered property may be given a civil penalty of up to £7,000, and a local authority may impose more than one penalty where a breach continues or is repeated.

Where breaches are repeated or serious, or where false information is supplied, section 91 allows a penalty of up to £40,000 and section 92 creates offences carrying the possibility of prosecution. These are not nominal figures, and they attach to the landlord rather than to the agent.

What you will need

Registration is done through a GOV.UK One Login, so anyone without one should create it in advance rather than on the day. You will be asked for information about yourself, about each dwelling and about the tenancy: the address, the property type, the number of bedrooms and occupants, the rent charged, and whether the property is subject to a mandatory, additional or selective licence.

You will also need the safety documentation, meaning the gas safety record, the electrical installation condition report and the energy performance certificate. Anyone whose certificates are scattered across email, an agent's system and a drawer has a filing job to do before February rather than a registration job.

If you use a letting agent

This is the point most often misunderstood. An agent or property manager can supply much of the information, and with the landlord's authority can help to populate the entry, but the duty to register rests on the landlord and cannot be delegated away. If registration is not completed it is the landlord who cannot obtain possession, and the landlord who receives the penalty. A conversation with your agent about who is doing what, and by when, is worth having before Christmas.

What to do between now and February

Little of this is difficult, but it is the sort of administration that slides. Create the One Login. Assemble the certificates for each property and note which of them expire before the registration window closes. List your properties by region and write down each one's deadline. Check the licensing position for each, since you will be asked. And if an agent holds your documents, ask for copies now rather than in the spring.

A landlord who does that in the autumn will spend an hour on it in February. A landlord who leaves it will spend the spring chasing gas engineers, and if a possession claim becomes necessary in the meantime will discover the restriction in section 90 at the worst possible moment.

A gateway, not a form

It is tempting to file this with the other administrative burdens of the last two years and deal with it when the letter arrives. That reading misses what the database is for. It is not a registry kept for its own sake. It is the mechanism through which the reformed possession regime is policed, and Parliament has made compliance the price of access to the court. Sixty five pounds a year is a modest sum. Being unable to recover a property is not.

The law is stated as at 10 September 2026. This article is general information and not legal advice, and the position on any particular tenancy depends on its own facts.

About the author: Dr Aamir Nawaz, LLB (Hons), LLM, PhD, Solicitor, Barrister (np) and Notary Public.