Landlords and building owners responsible for taller multi-occupied residential buildings in England now face new legal duties to identify residents who may need help evacuating in a fire and, where appropriate, agree personal evacuation arrangements.
The change comes through the Fire Safety (Residential Evacuation Plans) (England) Regulations 2025, which introduce Residential Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans, or RPEEPs. The rules apply to buildings with two or more domestic premises that are 18 metres or seven storeys and above, or above 11 metres where a simultaneous evacuation strategy is in place.
What the new fire safety rules require
For landlords, the new burden falls mainly on those acting as the Responsible Person in higher-risk residential buildings, or those managing assets where the Responsible Person role sits with a freeholder or specialist manager. The regulations require reasonable steps to identify residents who may struggle to evacuate without help because of a physical or cognitive impairment.
Where a resident wants support, the Responsible Person must offer a personalised fire risk assessment and agree an emergency evacuation statement. A building-wide evacuation plan must also be created and kept up to date.
This follows Landlord Knowledge’s March report on dual evacuation lift rules for new high-rises, which showed how building safety regulation is becoming more detailed and more operational. The latest change pushes that trend further by moving from design standards to resident-specific evacuation planning.
Why smaller landlords should still pay attention
Not every buy-to-let investor will fall directly within scope, but landlords with flats in taller blocks should not assume this is only a freeholder problem. Leaseholders, managing agents and block owners will need clear lines of responsibility, especially where vulnerable residents are known to live in the building.
There is also a practical risk for portfolio landlords using mixed management arrangements. If the freeholder or block manager is slow to implement the new regime, leaseholder landlords may still face tenant questions, insurer concerns or compliance requests. In that sense, the regulation is a warning that building safety duties are becoming harder to ignore even when they sit one step removed from the tenancy agreement.
For property investors, the likely outcome is more documentation, more co-ordination with managing agents and a stronger expectation that resident vulnerability is treated as a live safety issue rather than a box-ticking exercise.
Landlords also need to keep an eye on cost. The headline aim is resident safety, but every new process in taller blocks tends to feed through into service charges, management overheads or insurance discussions. That is the part many investors will feel first.
What this means for landlords
- If you own flats in taller blocks: ask who is acting as the Responsible Person and how RPEEP compliance is being handled.
- Watch for: service charge increases or fresh information requests from managing agents and block managers.
- Bottom line: fire safety compliance is becoming more resident-specific, and landlords in taller buildings need to know who is carrying the duty.
Editor’s view
These rules are sensible in principle, but they add another layer to a building safety system that already feels complex for many landlords. Investors in taller blocks should be wary of treating this as someone else’s problem. When compliance goes wrong, the consequences rarely stay neatly with the managing agent.
Author: Editorial Team – UK landlord & buy-to-let news, policy, and finance
Published: 08 April 2026
Sources: Legislation.gov.uk
Related reading: New high-rises to require dual evacuation lifts under fire safety rules
