Shortly before the removal of section 21, Lord Jamieson, a Tory peer, questioned whether the court system would be able to cope with an expected rise in cases from section 8 evictions, suggesting the act should be delayed until it was ready.
Landlords feared an influx of court cases since the reforms had been enacted, lengthening delays and piling financial pressure on smaller buy-to-let owners.
Chris Norris, at the National Residential Landlords Association, said there was a “real risk” that excessive waiting times and spiralling costs could force English landlords to exit the sector.
“If you’ve only got a couple of properties and you have the prospect potentially of losing all income from one of those properties for a year while you’re waiting for a court date, it’s enough to hit your viability and drive you out of business.”
He added that as well as the costs of going through the courts, which in some cases could rise into five figures, delays removing troublesome tenants could inflict additional costs where damage had occurred.
“If you do have a really drawn-out possession case, particularly if it’s because of anti-social behaviour, rectifying everything by the time you get to the end of the tenancy can run into the thousands,” he said.
John Blackwood, the chief executive of the Scottish Association of Landlords, said ministers in both countries needed to do more to improve the process of evicting tenants.
He added: “Delayed tribunals directly impact the number of available properties and every property out of action drags down the housing supply. This is where politicians need to focus and develop solutions.”
A government spokesman said: “Landlords will only need to take possession action in the courts in a small minority of cases where a tenant doesn’t leave at the end of a notice period.
“We expect our reforms to reduce pressure on the courts in the long term but to support them now, we are recruiting up to 1,000 judges and tribunal members across all courts and tribunals this year.”