Article by Kate Sunol Marketing Manager, Industry and Growth 11 March 2025

The NSW rental landscape is evolving with the Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2024, bringing significant reforms that impact both renters and Property Managers. Passed on 24 October 2024, this legislation aims to improve rental security, affordability and transparency, heavily favouring renters. 

Some changes — such as restrictions on upfront fees and a cap on rent increases — are already in effect, while others, including the end of ‘no grounds’ evictions and easier pet approvals, will roll out in early 2025. So, what do these changes mean for Property Managers and owners? And how can you stay compliant while maintaining efficiency? Let’s break it all down, with expert insights and solutions to help you navigate the shift smoothly.

What is changing and when does it start?

On 24 October 2024, as part of the Minns Labor Government delivering on its election promise to ‘make renting fairer’, NSW Parliament passed the Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill 2024. The legislation is now the Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2024 (the Act). 

The changes already in effect include:  

• Preventing extra fees at the start of a tenancy, including fees for background checks and for preparing a tenancy agreement 
• Limiting rent increases to once per year

The changes expected in early 2025:

• Requiring landlords to provide reasons to end a lease — ending ‘no grounds’ terminations for renters
• Making it easier for renters to keep pets
• Ensuring renters can pay rent by bank transfer or Centrepay

We’ll take a closer look at each of these changes and how they impact property management practices.

Spoiler alert: there are a bunch of PropertyMe features and tips from some industry experts that can help!

Changes already in effect, as of October 2024

Prohibiting costs at the start of tenancies (for renters)

Owners and Agents are no longer permitted to charge fees to renters at the start of a tenancy.

Prohibited fees include:

• A background check
• Showing a property
• Preparing or filling in the tenancy agreement
• Initial copies of keys or other opening devices
• A bond to allow tenants to keep a pet on the property

Permitted fees include those relating to the ongoing tenancy costs, including:

• A holding fee or deposit of no more than one weeks of rent
  After being approved for a property, to go towards the first week of rent upon signing an agreement
• A rental bond of no more than 4 weeks of rent
• Rent in advance of no more than 2 weeks
  The landlord or agent must offer at least one method for paying rent that can be used without incurring additional costs (other than the usual bank or account fees).
• Fee for registering the lease with  NSW Land Registry Services if it is a fixed term agreement of 3 or more years

Likely impact

With several rent collection platforms charging fees to tenants, the largest impact will be to Property Managers using third-party apps to process rent payments. 

MePay is a great option for Property Managers to comply with this legislation change as it is completely integrated with real-time updates in PropertyMe — meaning no manual receipting, it’s integrated with the tenant app, alongside their payment schedule, invoices and other property information, and it is completely free for both tenants and agencies, there are no fees passed on.

Rent increases

The number of rent increases an Owner or Property Manager may issue has been reduced from two increases to one increase per year. Previously, only periodic leases and fixed-term leases of two years or more had this rule. It now applies to all leases.

What does this mean for Property Managers?

With a longer wait between increase periods, owners and Property Managers will need to be diligent in raising rents to the market rate during the window allowed to keep in line with market rates, rather than smaller staged increases across two increases in the year.

For example, instead of applying a $10 per week increase in June and another $10 in December, the whole $20 would be applied in June.

We recommend adding a section to the message template for rental increase notices to landlords advising them of the change and ensuring they are aware before processing any rent increases. Or use it as an opportunity to provide proactive service and jump on the phone for your next rent increase. 

If you’re still not sold on proactive customer service, check out the following stats:

• For 86% of consumers, good customer service turns one-time clients into long-term brand champions (Khoros)
• If a company’s customer service is excellent, 78% of consumers will do business with them again after a mistake (Salesforce Research)

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Changes coming soon

Ending ‘no grounds’ terminations for renters

What are ‘no grounds’ terminations?

In NSW, Property Owners and Managers currently have several legal grounds to terminate a residential tenancy agreement. One of these is a ‘no grounds’ termination, which requires 90 days’ notice and does not require a reason for ending the lease. However, this will soon be prohibited in NSW.

The move to ban ‘no grounds’ terminations is a growing trend across Australia. They are already prohibited in:

• Victoria (from October 2024)
• Australian Capital Territory (from April 2023)
• South Australia (from July 2024)

States where ‘no grounds’ terminations are still allowed:

• Queensland & Tasmania — Partial bans are in place, permitting ‘no grounds’ terminations only at the end of fixed-term agreements (but not during periodic agreements)
• Western Australia & Northern Territory — ‘No grounds’ terminations are still permitted both at the end of fixed-term agreements and during periodic agreements

Additional terms

In addition to this, the changes introduce offences and penalties for both Property Managers and landlords, in relation to:

• Giving termination notices on grounds that are not genuine, and
• Providing false or misleading supporting documents or information when giving a termination notice.

Except in instances where Property Managers could ‘easily find out’ if landlords’ instructions were in breach of the above terms.

Why the change?

NSW Rental Commissioner, Trina Jones spoke on this topic at the 2024 PropTech Forum, explaining the concept behind the introduction is security for renters and reducing the disruption of multiple moves. If a property is available to be general public to be rented, then it should be available to the current tenants, if they have not breached any lease conditions.

What does this mean for Property Managers?

Owners and Property Managers are now required to provide reasons and evidence to the tenant for termination of a tenancy.

The permitted reasons include:

• The existing rules where the renter is at fault, because of a breach of lease, damage to the property or non-payment of rent
• The property is being sold or offered for sale with vacant possession
• The property needs to be empty for significant repairs or renovations or the property will be demolished
• The property will no longer be used as a rental home, for example, it will instead be used for a business
• The landlord or their family intend to move into the property
• The renter lives in the property as part of their employment and their employment has ended
• The renter is no longer eligible for an affordable or transitional housing program or the property is purpose-built student accommodation and the renter is no longer a student
• The property is part of a key worker housing program and needs to be used by a key worker, like a teacher, health worker or police

We are yet to see what evidence will be required, as the drafted regulations have not been released.

From a day-to-day practice

Key changes to the day-to-day practices of Property Managers will likely include a more rigorous tenant selection process. This means placing greater reliance on prior references and rental history, rather than offering tenants the benefit of the doubt or a chance, as terminating leases for problematic tenants will become more challenging.

Additionally, there will be a stronger focus on documenting and addressing breaches as they occur, rather than waiting until the end of a fixed term to assess whether the situation improves.

Exclusion periods and amended notice periods

The following exclusion periods for re-leasing and amended notice periods apply to terminations for the following reasons:

Standard Residential Tenancy Agreements

Other Tenancy Agreements

Exclusion periods do not apply in the following scenarios.

Full details of termination and exclusion periods can be found here.

Early exit notices for tenants

If a tenant under a fixed-term agreement has been given a termination notice, they may give the landlord an ‘early exit’ notice, providing 14 days’ notice that they will be giving vacant possession before the termination date.

The tenant is then not liable to pay rent for the period after:

• the tenancy end date specified in the early exit notice, and
• vacant possession being given

Making it easier for renters to keep pets

Approval of pets

Renters will be allowed to keep pets at rental properties, unless owners or Property Managers decline the pet application within 21 days, for one of the following reasons:

• There would be too many animals at the property
• The property is unsuitable for the animal because of the fencing, or lack of open space, or because it would harm the animal’s welfare
• The animal is likely to cause more damage than the bond could repair
• The landlord lives at the property
• The animal would break other laws, local council rules, strata or community scheme by-laws or a residential community rule
• The renter did not agree to a reasonable condition for keeping the animal

Note: The regulations, which have not yet been released, may make further provision in relation to grounds including by clarifying or defining terms used in the grounds.

Conditions for keeping pets

Reasonable conditions for keeping animals include:

• For a type of animal that is not normally kept inside residential premises — a condition preventing the animal from being inside the premises
• For an animal that will be kept inside the residential premises — a condition requiring the tenant, at the end of the tenancy
  • to have carpets professionally cleaned (if reasonable for the type of animal and the premises)
  • for a mammal — to have the premises professionally fumigated
• A condition that
  • relates only to keeping the animal at the premises, and
  • is reasonable in relation to the type of animal and the premises

Unreasonable conditions for keeping animals include:

• A condition increasing rent
• A condition increasing the rental bond
• A condition requiring a form of security
• A condition that is not permitted to be included as a term of a residential tenancy agreement

Additional terms

Landlords and Property Managers must not advertise, in relation to residential premises for lease, that a tenant’s animal will not be permitted to be kept at the residential premises.

What does this mean for Property Managers?

Until more information is released regarding the reasons for declining an application, it’s hard to know how much impact this will have on owners and Property Managers. 

Tips for Property Managers processing these legislation changes include:

• Establish a streamlined pet application process to promptly respond to any requests within 21 days. We recommend using Task Templates, Message Templates and Task Automation to considerably streamline the process and speed up communication
• Develop a Renting with Pets Policies and Procedures for your agency per the above requirements, including considerations such as:
  • Safety and access for Property Managers during inspections
  • Safety for other residents within shared complexes and any applicable strata guidelines
  • Local laws and council regulations
  • Animal welfare and suitability 
  • Any modifications required to accommodate pets
  • Animal welfare on vacating (eg. not leaving pets behind)
• Liaise with Landlord Insurance companies to identify any gaps between policies and new legislation
• Configure labels or alerts to see at a glance which properties have approved pets and filter properties by pet status for communications or bulk task processing
• Add a ‘pet’ tag to keys so Property Managers and trades can easily identify which properties will have pets on site and safely conduct their work accordingly
• Review office procedures for team safety when on site, incorporating the recent feature update for Duress Alerts with notifications to users.
• Review advertising listings and remove any mentions of pets being “not permitted” and/or add a checklist item for advertising compliance checks

Extra reading: The RSPCA provides guidance on suitable environments and responsible ownership through the RSPCA Policy A2 Responsible companion animal ownership, including considerations such as:

• “A comfortable, safe, and enjoyable environment with appropriate housing, shelter, environmental enrichment, space, and complexity”
• “Being respectful of others and avoiding or minimising the potential for negative impacts on other animals (including wildlife), the community, and the environment.”
• “Making provisions for ongoing care when the owner is unable to provide care themselves”
• “Planning to safeguard their animal’s safety and welfare in the event of an emergency (e.g. a natural disaster like a bushfire or flood).”

Making it easier for Tenants to pay via bank transfer or Centrepay

Property owners and Property Managers will be required to offer a way to pay rent that is electronic and without additional fees to renters. Renters will be able to choose a bank transfer method or payment via the Commonwealth Government’s Centrepay. 

(Note Centrepay incurs processing fees for registered businesses which cannot be passed on to a Tenant).

If both the renter and landlord agree, the renter can choose to pay rent using other options.

What next?

While some of these changes are already in effect, others — such as the end of ‘no grounds’ evictions and streamlined pet approvals — are set to roll out in early 2025. However, many of the finer details, including the specific regulations and evidence requirements for terminations, are yet to be finalized. 

As we await further clarity on the legislative framework and effective dates, Property Managers and owners should stay informed and prepare for compliance. Keeping up with industry updates, leveraging the right tools and adapting processes proactively will be key to navigating this evolving rental landscape with confidence. Stay tuned for more insights and practical solutions as we continue to break down these changes.

For more information:

• The Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2024 No 75
• REINSW Navigate the New Landscape: Mastering The NSW Rental Reforms
• Meet with the NSW Fair Trading team at this year’s Royal Easter Show
• Centrepay