How can valuation rolls help me prove I was a tenant for a number of years?

Because valuation rolls record the name of the tenant and the owner of each property, they are accepted as evidence of a tenancy for some purposes.

To use valuation rolls in this way, someone has to search back through the valuation rolls for period concerned. This typically takes an hour or two but becomes more complicated and time-consuming if the tenant rented several houses in succession. There will be charges for providing copies and there may be charges for the search.

Valuation rolls do not provide exact dates of tenancy. There are, however, limitations, which should be borne in mind:

(1) Valuation rolls record only heads of household (in theory, the person whose name was on the lease). If the spouse of a tenant, or some other member of the household, wishes to prove residence, they may need to use voters rolls in addition to the valuation roll: i.e. the valuation roll proves that the house was a council house, but only records the head of the household, while the voters roll records the names of the other adult members of the household.

(2) Valuation rolls were published once a year (in May, until 1975; in April thereafter).
The information was gathered in the Autumn of the previous year. So, it takes a valuation roll a year or two to catch up with a change of tenancy. For example: a council tenant moves into 999, Letsby Avenue in January 1968 he then moves to 45, Rebellion Street in October 1975.

In the 1968 roll (compiled Autumn 1967) he is not listed at either address.
In the 1969 roll (compiled Autumn 1968) he is listed at Letsby Avenue.
In the 1975 roll (compiled Autumn 1974) he is listed at Letsby Avenue.
In the 1976 roll (compiled Autumn 1975) he is listed at Letsby Avenue.
In the 1977 roll (compiled Autumn 1976) he is listed at Rebellion Street.

Thus, the valuation roll appears to take two years to catch up with his change of address. In exceptional cases, local archives sometimes hold supplementary rolls, compiled by local Assessors, which record the date that a property appeared for the first time in the roll during the previous year. This is useful where the tenant was the first tenant in a new property

For further reasons why someone may not appear in a valuation roll, see the FAQ – Why might a person not appear in a valuation roll at an address he or she was resident at?