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Virtually all leases have clauses which stipulate that when the lease comes to an end, the tenant must leave the premises in the same condition as they were in when they entered them, and the negotiations over the termination of a lease will often involve a payment by the outgoing tenant to take account of the dilapidations.

In principle, the payment from the tenant to the landlord is to put the landlord back in the position it was in at the commencement of the lease: restoring the asset (the leased premises) to its former condition.

The United Kingdom has very favourable Inheritance Tax (IHT) treatment for the owners of business assets used in a trade and, in general, the value of these will be outside the charge to IHTmade that point in relieving a residential tenant of liability to pay service charges over a four-year period.

Rights of way across the land of others can become established if they have been used openly and without force for at least 20 years. However, such use must also be without permission and, as one case showed, that can often prove a sticking point.

The owners of land on which a workshop stood claimed a vehicular right of way over an adjoining yard. The First-tier Tribunal (FTT) found that the yard had been used as a means of vehicular access to the workshop for the required 20-year period.

In a decision of great importance to landlords of student accommodation, a tribunal has found that bedsits with communal facilities are not separate dwellings.