1. A method, in a data processing system comprising a processor and a memory coupled to the processor, for managing a multi-tenant software application adapted to serve a plurality of tenants, the method comprising: receiving, by the processor, a deletion request for deleting one of the tenants from the plurality of tenants, responsive to receiving the deletion request, disabling, by the processor, an instance of the software application associated with the tenant to be deleted, deleting, by the processor, the disabled instance of the software application associated with the tenant to be deleted after a protection period from the deletion request, wherein the deleting of the disabled instance of the software application associated with the tenant to be deleted comprises: responsive to the assigned instances of the software application being in excess of the pre-apportioned set of instances of the software application, dropping, by the processor, the instance of the software application assigned to the disabled tenant, and responsive to the assigned instances of the software application being less than the pre-apportioned set of instances of the software application, freeing, by the processor, the instance of the software application assigned to the disabled tenant, receiving, by the processor, an addition request for adding a new tenant to the software application, responsive to a pre-apportioned instance of the software application being available in a pre-apportioned set of instances of the software application, allocating, by the processor, the available pre-apportioned instance of the software application for the new tenant to a selected instance of the software application, and responsive to a pre-apportioned instance of the software application failing to be available in the pre-apportioned set of instances of the software application, allocating, by the processor, a new instance of the software application in excess of the pre-apportioned set of instances of the software application to the selected instance of the software application.