The notice of the knock is counted in days

A week, in five places

A property inspection begins with a piece of paper, and the five jurisdictions here differ mainly in how long before the visit that paper has to arrive. Queensland is the plainest of the five. The tenant must be given a minimum of 7 days’ notice for entry, using an Entry notice (Form 9), and the first routine inspection can be carried out at any time after the tenancy agreement has commenced on that same 7 days. Entry can be at a specific time, or the owner or manager can give a 2-hour window, such as between 9 and 11am.

The ACT asks for the same week in writing: a landlord must give a tenant at least one week’s notice in writing before any standard inspection, and the Act behind the page says the lessor must give the tenant 1 week written notice of an inspection. Before going at all, a landlord there must give the tenant notice first and go at a time that is reasonable for both sides.

Victoria’s week lives inside the entry provisions of the Act, which are worth reading at the source: a residential rental provider or agent has a right to enter the rented premises, together with anyone needed for the purpose, each day from 8am to 6pm, public holidays excepted, and for an inspection of the premises at least 7 days’ notice must have been given to the renter in the required form. The state’s consumer page adds the plain version: the notice must be in writing and state the reason for entry, and how much notice depends on the reason.

From RTA Queensland: routine inspections, ACT Government: during a tenancy, Residential Tenancies Act 1997 (ACT), Residential Tenancies Act 1997 (Vic), Consumer Affairs Victoria: when a rental provider can enter a property.

Two states keep counting after the week

Western Australia states its notice as a range, and both ends matter. It is a term of every residential tenancy agreement there that the lessor may enter for a routine inspection, on a day and at a reasonable time specified by notice in writing given to the tenant: not less than 7 days before the proposed entry, and within 14 days before it. A tenant reading the first half alone would think a notice could wait in a drawer; the second half stops that. The notice itself must be in writing and state the reason, using Form 19; the page also wants the tenant told who is coming, at what time, and why. It is also a term of every residential tenancy agreement in the state that where a lessor gives a tenant notice of an intention to enter on a particular day, the notice must specify the day of the entry and whether the entry will be before or after noon on that day.

South Australia’s range runs wider. In that state it is a term of a residential tenancy agreement that the landlord, or an agent of the landlord, may enter the premises to inspect them only in accordance with a written notice given to the tenant no less than 7 and no more than 28 days before the day of entry, stating the purpose and the date of the proposed entry and specifying a period of up to 2 hours in which the entry will occur, which must sit within normal hours. Normal hours there are defined as between 8am and 8pm on any day other than a Sunday or public holiday. The 2-hour window can be left out only where the premises are remote or the visitor must be accompanied, and even then the entry must occur within normal hours.

From Residential Tenancies Act 1987 (WA), Consumer Protection WA: rent inspections and privacy rights, Residential Tenancies Act 1995 (SA).

Queensland’s worked example, day by day

One state prints the counting for a 48-hour entry. If the lessor or agent hands the tenant an entry notice at 2.30pm on a Tuesday, the lessor or agent may enter from 2.30pm on the Thursday. The Act’s own example for a 48-hour entry counts from the moment the notice is handed over, not from the start of the next day.

The Act states the same arithmetic as a condition: the lessor or the lessor’s agent may enter the premises only if an entry notice is given at least 7 days before entering, for an inspection, or at least 48 hours before it, for another entry. The owner or manager must also state a period of up to two hours in which the entry will happen, and may only enter within it. An entry notice is needed for each entry: the authority is clear that the form is not a standing permission.

From Residential Tenancies and Rooming Accommodation Act 2008 (Qld), RTA Queensland: open houses and viewings.

What a notice has to say, and how it arrives

A notice is a document with contents, not only a lead time. In Victoria it must be in writing, state why the provider or agent wishes to enter, and be given by post or delivered personally to the renter between the hours of 8am and 6pm. If it goes by post, enough time must be allowed for delivery. The consumer page advises allowing for mail delivery times and, where proof of sending matters, registered post.

Queensland requires the notice to be in writing on a form called an Entry notice, and the owner or manager may only enter for a valid reason once the correct notice has been given in that form. Western Australia’s Form 19 and South Australia’s written notice carry the same weight in their states: the purpose, the day, the window, and who is coming.

From Residential Tenancies Act 1997 (Vic), Consumer Affairs Victoria: when a rental provider can enter a property, RTA Queensland: rules of entry, general tenancies, RTA Queensland: entry to the property.

Where to check the figure yourself

For New South Wales, the state’s page, linked below, says that correct notice should be given in most cases, and that there are legitimate reasons for entry without the tenant’s consent as long as the minimum notice required is complied with. For the number of days’ notice a routine inspection needs, check that page. For Tasmania, check the Residential Tenancy Act 1997, linked below. It lets an owner enter for a routine inspection by giving at least 24 hours’ notice: once every 3 months, or once a month in boarding premises. For the Northern Territory, check the Residential Tenancies Act 1999 (NT), linked below.

From NSW Fair Trading: landlord access and entry, Residential Tenancy Act 1997 (Tas), Residential Tenancies Act 1999 (NT).

What the comparison is worth

Put the five figures beside each other and one thing holds across all five: a renter is given at least a week’s warning of a routine inspection. Tasmania is the exception to that one-week pattern: its Act asks for at least 24 hours. What varies is the far end. Queensland, Victoria and the ACT name a single 7-day minimum and stop; Western Australia requires the notice to be given within 14 days before the visit; South Australia allows a notice to be given as much as 28 days early. The drawing at the top of this page keeps that shape: the week-long lines of the same length, and two of them continuing as an open span to the ceiling their law sets.

The notice is also only the first of the drawing’s three questions. How often the knock may return is the tally column; which days and hours it may land on is the day strip; and how the visit itself runs, and who may be there, is the fourth guide.