Notice to Vacate ACT: What Landlords Can and Cannot Do in 2026

If you are an ACT investment property owner who has just discovered that no-cause evictions no longer exist here, you are not alone. This is one of the most significant operational surprises facing interstate investors who enter the Canberra market carrying assumptions from New South Wales, Queensland, or Victoria.

In most Australian jurisdictions, a landlord can end a periodic tenancy by issuing a standard notice at the end of a lease — no specific reason required, no evidence to produce, no legal standard to meet. In the ACT, that option is gone. The Residential Tenancies Act 1997 has been amended to remove without-cause terminations entirely. To regain possession of your own investment property from a compliant tenant, you need a valid, documented, and legally defensible reason.

The End of No-Cause Evictions in the ACT

Until relatively recently, ACT landlords could issue a 26-week "no-cause" notice to end a periodic tenancy without providing any justification. That mechanism no longer exists.

The ACT is now one of the most stringently tenant-protective jurisdictions in Australia. The legislative rationale is housing security — the government did not want tenants being removed arbitrarily from housing they had been occupying responsibly. The practical consequence for investors is that the "exit valve" on difficult tenancy situations is now formally constrained.

This does not mean you cannot end a tenancy. It means you must be able to point to a specific statutory ground and serve the correct notice for that ground. If the tenant disputes the notice at ACAT, you must be able to demonstrate the ground is genuine.

Grounds for Termination: Notice Periods and Evidence Requirements

The following are the valid grounds under which a landlord can issue a Notice to Vacate to a compliant tenant (i.e., one who is not in breach of the lease):

The "intends to sell" ground is the most commonly used, but it is not a blank cheque. If a landlord issues a notice on the grounds of intended sale but then does not list the property within a reasonable timeframe, the tenant can challenge the notice at ACAT as pretextual. The same applies to the "move in" ground — if the landlord does not actually occupy the property after the tenant vacates, ACAT can find the notice invalid and impose compensation.

For breach situations — non-payment of rent, illegal activity, serious damage — shorter breach notice periods apply separately from the above framework. A 14-day notice is standard for significant rent arrears or serious lease breaches. These notices are independent of the grounds framework above.

ACAT Challenge Rights: How Tenants Can Respond

The Residential Tenancies Act gives tenants the right to challenge a Notice to Vacate at ACAT the moment they receive it, not just after their move-out date passes. If a tenant believes the notice was issued in bad faith, in retaliation for exercising their legal rights (such as requesting urgent repairs or complaining to Access Canberra), or without genuine grounds, they can file immediately for the notice to be set aside.

ACAT has broad powers to:

• Declare a notice invalid
• Order compensation to the tenant if the notice was retaliatory or defective
• Impose penalties on landlords who issue notices in bad faith

This framework demands careful documentation. If you are issuing a notice to vacate on the grounds of intended major renovation, you should have contractor quotes, council permits, and a genuine timeline in order before the notice goes out. If you intend to move a family member in, that intention should be genuine and demonstrable. Issuing notices speculatively or as a de facto way of ending a tenancy you just want to exit is a strategy that ACAT has seen many times and that it regularly penalises.

The Prescribed Amount: How ACT Rent Increases Work

The ACT's rent increase restrictions operate alongside the eviction rules and collectively form the tightest regulatory framework for landlords in Australia.

Under the Residential Tenancies Act, rent cannot be increased during a fixed-term lease at all, unless a specific and mathematically defined formula was included in the lease agreement before it was signed. Once a tenancy becomes periodic (month to month), rent can only be increased:

• Once every 12 months
• With a minimum of 8 weeks' written notice

More importantly, any increase is capped by the "prescribed amount." This is not a fixed number set in advance — it is calculated annually and tied to the CPI.

The prescribed amount formula: 110% of the percentage change in the rents component of the housing group of the CPI for Canberra, as published by the ABS.

In practical terms: if the Canberra rental CPI grew by 4.0% over the relevant period, the maximum rent increase a landlord can impose on an existing tenant without ACAT approval is 4.4% (110% of 4.0%).

If you want to increase rent above the prescribed amount — because your land tax bill has gone up, your mortgage rate has increased, or local market rents have surged substantially above what you are receiving — you cannot simply demand it. You must:

1. Seek the tenant's written consent following a formal disclosure process, or
2. Apply to ACAT for an order permitting the excess increase

ACAT will only approve increases above the prescribed amount if you can demonstrate substantial capital improvements to the property, or prove extreme market parity shifts that make the current rent materially below comparable properties in the area. It is not an easy threshold to meet.

What This Means for Investors in Practice

The practical consequence of these rules for investors is that you effectively earn open-market rent only during periods of tenant turnover. If a tenant stays for three or four years, their rent progressively falls behind market rates — tracked to CPI inflation rather than market conditions. When they eventually vacate, you can re-price to market, but you will typically have a vacancy gap while doing so.

For properties that are in high demand — units on the light rail corridor, well-maintained houses in government precinct suburbs — tenant turnover happens often enough that this lag is manageable. For properties in oversupplied corridors where tenant retention is longer-term, the gap can be material.

Some investors deliberately factor this dynamic into their strategy by targeting shorter lease terms at property turnover to reset to market rates more frequently. Others opt for DHA leases, which use independent annual market valuations to adjust rent rather than a CPI cap. Neither is a perfect solution, but both are rational responses to the regulatory environment.

The Insulation Compliance Deadline

One additional compliance item worth noting for ACT landlords in 2026: a mandatory ceiling insulation standard is being phased in for rental properties. Properties with no existing ceiling insulation or insulation below R2 must be upgraded to a minimum of R5.

For existing long-term leases, the compliance deadline is 30 November 2026. For new leases, a 9-month window applies from the start of the tenancy. Investors purchasing older established housing stock — particularly homes built before 1990 in suburbs like Chisholm, Weston Creek, or Kambah — should budget for this upgrade as part of acquisition due diligence. The cost of installing R5 ceiling insulation in a standard Canberra house typically ranges from $1,200 to $2,500 depending on access and current insulation status.

Navigating ACT tenancy compliance correctly — notice-to-vacate procedures, prescribed rent increases, insulation mandates, and ACAT risk management — requires working with a property manager who knows the local framework. The Australian Capital Territory Investment Property Guide includes a complete ACT landlord compliance checklist, notice-to-vacate template guidance, and rent increase calculation examples for 2025–2026.

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