Foxtons has become the first high-profile casualty of Labour's Renters' Rights Act, warning that its lucrative student lettings arm is being disrupted by tenants who can now walk away from tenancies mid-course. The abolition of fixed-term assured shorthold tenancies (ASTs) — a central plank of the new legislation — means all tenancies, including those signed by students for a full academic year, automatically convert to rolling periodic arrangements. In practice, that gives any tenant the right to serve two months' notice and leave whenever it suits them, regardless of what the original contract said. For an agency like Foxtons, which has built a meaningful revenue stream around guaranteed 12-month student lets in London, the shift has already begun to show up in the numbers, with the company flagging softer-than-expected lettings income and citing the reform directly as a drag on performance.