How a landlord can end a lease for breach of covenant, and how tenants and others with a stake in the lease can save it.
Forfeiture brings the whole lease crashing down, taking sub-leases and mortgages with it — which is why the law hedges it with strict procedure and a generous safety net. This chapter begins with the nature of forfeiture and how the right to forfeit arises, then works through the procedural divide between non-payment of rent and other breaches, including the formal demand and the three requirements of a section 146 notice. It explains how a landlord can lose the right through waiver, particularly by demanding or accepting rent, and the two methods of forfeiting — court proceedings and peaceable re-entry, with the limits on the latter for residential and commercial premises. It closes with relief from forfeiture: when the court will restore the lease to the tenant, and how sub-tenants and mortgage lenders can apply for relief in their own right.
