If you die your wife, husband or civil partner can take over your tenancy of the property you live in as long as all of the following apply:

• He or she has been living in the property immediately before your death
• It is his or her only or main home
• The tenancy has not been passed on from someone else

Passing on your tenancy in this way is known as “succession”. It means that your wife, husband or civil partner will have any rights that you had, for example, the right to buy, and also any responsibilities for example to pay any outstanding rent.

If you are not married or in a civil partnership we will offer a new tenancy to your partner or close member of your family as long as the following apply:

• He or she has been living with you for at least a year immediately before your death
• The property is his or her only or main home
• The tenancy has not been passed on from someone else

In these circumstances, the tenancy may not be the tenancy of the property you live in. For example, if you live in a bungalow which we would normally offer to people aged 60 or over, we will normally ask a younger person to move to different accommodation.

Only one person can be given a tenancy. Members of your family should agree between themselves who this should be. We will decide if they can’t agree.

If your tenancy has been passed to you from someone else (including a joint tenancy becoming a single tenancy) we will offer a new tenancy to either your husband, wife, partner or other members of your family or carer as long as the following apply:

• They have been living with you for at least a year immediately before your death
• The property if their only or main home
• They have not been involved in breaking your tenancy agreement, for example behaving in an anti-social way.
• They meet the financial criteria in our lettings policy.

Again the new tenancy may not be the tenancy of the property that you live in and we may ask them to move somewhere else. We will normally only offer one tenancy but it may be a joint tenancy.

If you need more information on this matter, please contact us.

Passing on your tenancy to someone else while you are still alive is known as assignment. You must get our written permission to do this. You can only normally assign your tenancy to someone who would have been entitled to a right of succession if you had died. The only exceptions to this are if a court orders an assignment because of a relationship breakdown or if you are exchanging your home with someone else (mutual exchange).

If you need more information on this matter, please contact us.