Building owners should ensure that their buildings meet the new safety requirements around fire and structural safety, including the duty to register high rise residential buildings by the 1 October 2023, as failure to do so could result in enforcement action (including prosecution) by the newly commissioned Building Safety Regulator.

Building owners should develop a comprehensive safety case that demonstrates compliance with the new safety standards, as this will be a requirement for obtaining a building safety certificate. A report summarising this will be required as construction of higher risk buildings go through the new registration regime. In addition, high rise residential building owners now have a legal obligation to maintain accurate and digital records of building information and activities throughout the lifecycle of a building's design, construction, materials, maintenance and other areas of record. Failure to meet these record-keeping obligations could result in enforcement action by the Building Safety Regulator. 

The new gateway regime for construction, with its three stages of review, inspection and change approval throughout the planning, pre-construction, and completion phases, together with the obligation to prepare the golden thread, will mandate a rethink of the approach to the construction of high rise residential premises. 

Building safety legislation protects certain tenants by limiting the amount of service charge they need to pay to remediate certain building and fire safety defects. Landlords and Building Owners could be required to pay all or part of the service charge shortfall resulting from the application of these leaseholder protections. In particular, where buildings are managed by RTMs and RMCs, landlords and building owners could receive Remediation Contribution Requests in respect of these shortfalls. Landlords are also required to comply with the certification regimes imposed by the Leaseholder Protection Regulations within tight timescales. Failure to do so could result in a loss of their ability to recover building safety remediation costs that could otherwise have been lawfully demanded through the service charge from their tenants. In addition, Landlords, Building Owners and Developers should be aware of the ability of an interested party (which would include any tenants or other landlords at the building) to bring a claim in the FTT against them or their group companies for a Remediation Contribution Order. This is an order requiring those Landlords, building owners or developers to pay, or contribute to, building safety remediation costs that have been incurred or are to be incurred in respect of a building. 

Building owners should be prepared to respond to complaints from building residents about safety concerns and have a plan in place to address these issues promptly. Furthermore, limitation periods have been extended to between 15 and 30 years for new or existing buildings respectively, meaning developers, contractors, and consultants will be exposed to legal action for longer.