I have just discovered that my step sister is moving into the house underneath ourt house which we currently rent out

[Saltire]

Her and I hate each other, she is a nasty vindicitve person. Apprently her and my tennant are quite friendly, now (prepares to be flamed here), am I correct in thinking that I can't tell my tennant who she can and can't have in our house? I really don't want my step sister in my house at all! I know I sound petty, but if you knew the history between us you would understand why

If your step sister is as bad as you say, the minute you step into bunny-boiler territory by laying down access rules to your tenants, she's won.

No sane landlord would try to control this aspect of a tenants life - it's not your tenant's fault her neighbour is your nemesis, and you'd be putting the burden on the tenant alone - they're the one that has to live there.

With respects to the garden, I think it would be fair to drop a reasonably worded letter that you don't want your garden area to begin being regarded as community property - this will protect the rights of the next tenant, as well as yourself.

You have to try to ignore the proximity of your step-sister though, or you'll be trampling on the rights of someone entirely innocent, and you'll be looking for another tenant toot-sweet.

Fimbo has it right - we own the upstairs house which we rent out, and the underneath house is owned by someone else and is rented out.
Can I just clarify something about the garden. I know that if my tenant is having a BBQ I can't tell her who she can and can't invite, BUT there has been soemthing with the garden that you need to know. Each of the house has a garden, some are bigger than others. To the right of our house is another one is a similar lay out (one up, one down). Our house, and the three attached to it have a big garden divided into 4. On the left is another block of 4 houses, same design same thing with garden etc. Out garden had a fence round it,a dn washing poles etc. Someone has taken down the fence, removed the washing poles, and taken down the big dividing fence, and made it all open plan. It seems that every Tom Dick and Harry is using the whole space,a dn my mum was round having a look, she said there ar epiles od dog shite, toys etc (our tenant doesn't have a child). My mum was told she was on private property, and to get off and when she said "oh yes, this land (she was on our bit of the garden) belongs to my daughter, she was told "not any more". We got in touch with our solictior who advised us that we were perfectly within our rights to put our fence and washing poles back up, this we have done.
So when i said I didn't wnat people using my garden, I menat people other than those who were friends of my tenant round for a BBQ.

I don't wuite get the "having your cake and eating it comment though

I'd say you're well within your rights to have the fence and washing pole reinstated - I don't understand why your tenant would think they had the right to make that level of change to the property without your authorisation. It's also important, as I expect your solicitor pointed out, to retain your land as private and not allow the neighbours to acquire rights over it - I'm not sure of the details, but leaving it unfenced for a number of years, and not objecting to people treating it as public land, could give them a legal right to continue to use it, which would be an issue if you later did want to put the fence back.

But, if there's a gate/gap in the fence, and your neighbour doesn't stop people wandering in and out, then I don't think there's anything you can do. The existence of the fence makes it "private", so they're not going to acquire legal rights to it just because your tenant allows them to make use of it, so I don't think you can legally prevent her from doing that.

What does your lease with the tenant say about number of occupants - if anything? It's a number of years since we rented our house but at the time we had three named tenants and only they were supposed to live in the house. They were all liable for paying the rent and any arrears and if one of them moved, they had to notify us of the new tenants details. If you have something like that, you could insist on your tenant including your step-sister on the lease (which she may not want to do) or you could simply say that the lease if specific to her and you do not want extra people living in the house.

Is it a four in a block you own Saltire?
Good luck with the gardens as everyone just treats all the gardens as open plan, we have given up at this stage and barely even use our garden now.

Why don't you just give your current tennant notice and get someone else in, or sell your house?

I'm not clear, is your tenant living in your house with you? Or do they have a separate part, own front door etc? Or do you live elsewhere?

We rent out our basement flat, but though there is a back door leading to the garden, our tenant does not have any right to the garden, it's not part of the agreement (having said that, we would let a tenant that we liked use it, but not to the extent that they could organise a bbq).