South Australia rental laws for landlords: what's current since the 2024 reforms
SA abolished no-grounds terminations on 1 July 2024 and ties its minimum standards to a separate housing act rather than a checklist. A landlord's guide to the Residential Tenancies Act 1995 as it stands now.
South Australia was one of the earlier movers on tenancy reform, and the changes are now well embedded rather than pending. Here's what the Residential Tenancies Act 1995 requires today.
No-grounds evictions ended on 1 July 2024
If you're relying on advice written before mid-2024, it's out of date. A South Australian landlord now needs a specified ground to end a tenancy — the same shift NSW, Victoria, Queensland and the ACT have all made, on different timelines.
Minimum standards work differently here
Rather than a list of conditions written into the Residential Tenancies Act itself, South Australia ties minimum housing standards to the separate Housing Improvement Act 2016 regime. It's a different mechanism to Victoria's fourteen-item pre-advertising checklist or Queensland's nine, and it's worth knowing the rule lives in a different piece of legislation before you go looking for it in the RTA.
The rent clock resets with a new tenant
South Australia allows one rent increase per year, and — unlike Queensland — the clock is scoped to "the same parties." A new tenant starts a fresh 12 months, even if the previous tenant's rent went up recently. If you own property in both states, this is one of the easiest details to mix up.
Entry: four times a year
Routine inspections are capped at four per year, roughly in line with NSW's four-times-a-year rule.
Pets: 14 days
A written pet request gets the standard 14 days before silence counts as consent, and a written refusal from the landlord is enough — no tribunal step required.
Bonds step up above a rent threshold
The standard bond is four weeks' rent. Above a set weekly rent threshold, that steps up to six weeks. If your property sits near that line, check the current threshold before setting the bond — this is one of the more fiddly bond rules in the country and it's easy to under- or over-collect.
What we're leaving out, on purpose
A few specifics didn't clear our verification bar and aren't in this guide: smoke alarm, gas and electrical safety specifics, the cap on a tenant's self-help repair spending, and the commencement date for the Form A1 tenancy agreement. South Australia's Consumer and Business Services site wasn't accessible during our research to confirm these directly — check with CBS or a solicitor rather than relying on secondhand figures for any of them.
General information, not legal advice, current to the best of our research as at 30 July 2026. Confirm anything you're relying on with Consumer and Business Services SA or a solicitor before acting on it. See the state-by-state rental law comparison for how South Australia compares with the rest of the country.