Dear Nikki,
As a father of three daughters and a stepdaughter all of a similar age to you, I have to say alarm bells are ringing here, and this is not a situation I would like my own family to be in.
I hope the inexperience of your landlord is the reason why he is ignorant of his own unlawful behaviour, rather than something less savoury being at the root of it. I say this because for sure the behaviour you have described is unlawful.
First, even if your tenancy agreement states you should not make physical alterations to the house, which fitting a lock on your bedroom door would be, my view is that you may do so.
This would be on the basis that at the end of your tenancy you remove the lock and make good the damage to the door and door frame occasioned by the lock being fitted and removed. I would simply tell your landlord you are going to do that.
Admittedly, that may put you at risk of your landlord keeping back some of your deposit (if you paid one), but as long as you do a very good job of the repair and take photographs to prove it, he would not be justified in doing so.
Your landlord is entitled to a key, which you may think defeats the object of the lock. But here’s the key point (pun intended): as a tenant, you are entitled in law to be allowed “quiet enjoyment” of the house you rent.
Yes, your landlord still owns the house, but he is being paid to let you and your friends use it as your home, and so he really needs to understand he cannot just turn up as and when he wishes and let himself in. He must put you on notice of when he wishes to “inspect”, give a reason for his intended visit and then arrive only at the allotted time.
And it would not be reasonable for him to just say “I will be round every Saturday morning at 9am”. That would be too frequent, and you can and should object if he does that.
All of which links back to you putting a lock on your bedroom door. In this case, I think you should say he can have a key as long as he understands he may not enter unless he gives at least 24 hours’ notice and also say unless he gives a good reason for requiring access, you will consider it a breach of quiet enjoyment.
