Reference for tenancy

A tenant reference letter is a letter that we, or sometimes the local authority (if they are dealing with your application to register) send to your current or previous landlord before you move in. It includes a few questions for your landlord to answer. This is to help us understand a little more about your time living in their property and how your tenancy went.

Don’t worry, we’ll always ask for your permission before we contact your landlord and tell you what questions we plan to ask them.

We’ll ask for a reference from your current landlord. If you’re not currently renting a property (for example, if you’re currently staying with friends or family), we might ask for a reference from a previous landlord instead. 

Most likely, yes. But it’s entirely your landlord’s choice whether they do or not. They don’t legally have to.

Don’t panic though. If your current or previous landlord refuses to give you a reference, it doesn’t necessarily mean we won’t be able to offer you a home. Remember, honesty is always the best policy so please be upfront and let us know straight away about any problems that you think might affect your reference.

We’ll base our overall decision on whether we think you’d make the right fit for our home or not. If we have more than one suitable applicant for a home, we might need to select someone else if they’ve been waiting longer or have a higher level of priority.