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Tessa Shepperson, BA, LLB, Solicitor

Tessa Shepperson is the creator and editor of Landlord-Law and has written most of the content. Below is a brief biography.

Tessa was born in London and grew up in South London, going to Mary Datchelor Girls School, a direct grant grammar school (sadly now closed). She then went to Hull University to study Geography and then to Durham University to study for a PGCE. However she decided that teaching did not suit her, and left the course. There followed a rather bleak period - this was 1980 when unemployment was very high. Not knowing what else to do, she applied for a secretarial course at New College Durham, which she attended for a year learning shorthand and typing, together with basic economics and law.

It was during this time that Tessa discovered that she enjoyed law, so after completing the course she returned to London to work as a legal secretary (mostly at city firm Durrant Piesse, now part of Lovells) while studying for the London external law degree. After a couple of years she was able to leave secretarial work and work as a litigation assistant at Woodroffes solicitors. After completing the LLB course she went on to study for the Law Society Finals at the College of Law at Lancaster Gate. She passed the exams with merit and then took a year out to travel. Although Tessa took a rather long route to qualification, the secretarial skills she obtained proved invaluable later, plus working as a legal secretary is an excellent introduction to working as a solicitor.

After an enjoyable year out, Tessa moved to Norwich to do her articles at Cozens Hardy & Jewson (now Cozens Hardy LLP), qualifying in 1990, and staying on as an assistant solicitor in their litigation department. During her time there she had a 'mixed bag' of work with an emphasis on property litigation.

Tessa enjoyed working at CHJ but felt her future did not lie there, so in 1994 she decided to set up as a sole practitioner, working from home, as TJ Shepperson. Initially she did general litigation, including legal aid work, but again with an emphasis on property work, gradually acquiring a clientele for repossession work among local landlords and letting agents.

In 1995 Tessa met and married Graeme Gee who then joined her in the business as a paralegal specialising in employment claims. Together they obtained a legal aid franchise for the firm in late 1995 which was maintained until 1999. However during that year, it was decided to change the direction of the firm and withdraw from legal aid work. Tessa decided at that time to concentrate on her work for private landlords and specialise in residential landlord and tenant law.

For some years Tessa had been interested in the internet, and had learnt html (having attended an excellent short course at UEA) and written her own, rather basic, website for the firm. In 1999 it was decided to set up a specialist web-site for landlords. She was introduced to Gill Bishop at Bitenet in Bristol (www.bitenet.co.uk), who has been her web designer ever since.

The Landlord-Law site was initially set up as a marketing site for Tessa's work for landlords, with some free content, plus online instruction forms. It also contained a Q&A section where Tessa answered 10 readers questions every two weeks.

It was through the Q&A section that Tessa came to realise that many landlords and tenants had no idea of their legal rights and obligations. She then conceived the idea of an online subscription  information service. Feedback from readers confirmed that they would be prepared to pay for content and so the idea of Landlord Law was born.

However in the meantime Tessa had been contacted by the editor at Law Pack publishing.  After some initial work updating their forms, Tessa was commissioned to write her 'Residential Lettings' book. This proved very sucessful and has been in print ever since it was first publisehd in 2000 (and which is regularly updated every year). The research for the book was extremely valuable as it gave her a depth of knowledge on landlord work which most solicitors do not have, and was the basis for much of the initial content of the Landlord-Law site. Tessa subsequently wrote two more books for LawPack, 'Renting: The Essential Guide to Tenants Rights', aimed at tenants, and the Quick Guide to taking in a Lodger.

The Landlord-Law web-site was launched on 29 November 2001, and was immediately successful if moderately so. No fortunes have been made but the site has provided a steady income and has allowed Tessa to give up other areas of legal work and concentrate on the things she enjoyes doing. In 2010, technology having moved on considerably since 2001, Tessa commissioned Gill to develop a new site, this time using the open source software Drupal.  This was launched on XXX and is the site you are reading now!

In 2006 Tessa started her blog, the Landlord Law Blog. This was originaly just started for fun, but it has developed to become an important part of Tessa's online presence. In 2009 it was moved from the Google blogger service to a self hosted wordpress blog, with a new design from Gill Bishop.  Tessa also writes several other blogs, for example the Solicitors Online Blog, the Lodger Landlord and Green Blogging, and she is a contributor to Law Brief Update and the Yell.com solicitors blogs. 

She also writes for several journals and newsletters including Property Investor News, Property Auction News, and the Internet Newsletter for Lawyers, and she writes a regular column in the renting supplement of the Eastern Daily Press newspaper..

On a personal level Tessa and Graeme's son Patrick was born in October 1996.   Graeme continued working with Tessa up until September 2010, when he was elected a Green Party Councillor for Norwich City Council.  He now concentrates on his Council duties, but still works with Tessa in a supportive role.

When not working Tessa enjoys reading, cooking, growing vegetables, watching Dr Who, and walking in the country with her family.