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Arrears definition

What does Arrears mean? Arrears are sums that have fallen due for payment but remain unpaid after the due date. In legal practice this descriptive term is used across contexts (contractual, statutory and court-ordered), for example rent arrears, service charge arrears, mortgage arrears, council tax or maintenance arrears. Particular regimes may define arrears for their own purposes, but there is no single universal statutory definition. In leases, arrears are amounts reserved by the lease (such as rent, service charge and insurance rent) that the tenant has not paid when due. Leases commonly provide that, once arrears persist for a specified period, the landlord...

Rent arrears demand post‑expiry of a contracted‑out lease: preserve tenancy at will and avoid a periodic tenancy

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The tenant’s status

It is common, when a commercial lease comes to an end, for the occupier to stay on without putting a fresh contract in place. Where Part II of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 (LTA 1954) has been properly contracted out, that continued occupation is, at the outset, either as a tenant at will or as a tenant at sufferance. Once the landlord authorises the occupation, it can no longer amount to a tenancy at sufferance. By way of illustration, serving a notice stating that the occupation is on a tenant-at-will basis clearly constitutes consent. A Tenancy at Will is inherently fragile and precarious. It can be determined without any advance notice; a simple demand for possession is enough, and nothing further is required to end it by the landlord...

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Jonathan Edwards

Radcliffe Chambers

Jonathan Edwards practises at Radcliffe Chambers in Lincoln’s Inn. He specialises in contested probate, claims to trust and estate assets, claims for partnership and estate accounts, property litigation including landlord and tenant, and insolvency and commercial disputes.He is regularly instructed to represent clients in the High Court and County Court, and has been instructed to assist with proceedings in Jersey. Cases in which he has acted include Taylor v Taylor [2017] EWHC 1080 (Ch) and Burki v Seventy Thirty Limited [2018] EWHC 2151 (QB)....

Web page updated on 27/05/2026

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