Rental market is utterly broken

1 Every economist who ever drew breath agreed that rent controls were a bloody stupid idea.
2 Where's the money coming from? Or do you intend to rob people of their properties?
3 How will this solve the shortage of decent rental properties?

Ideology like yours is the cause of the problems, not the solution.

Nice post. You come across as a decent sensible landlord.

Personally, I could live without an oven, You can buy a decent microwave for around £60,00.

I have an oven in our motorhome, never ever used it.

Tenants need landlords and visa versa.

How can the average young person/couple save up for a decent deposit when they are paying almost £2000pm rent?

Those is such a laughably stupid idea that is actually quite sad that you think it is any sort of solution.

It won't depress prices any more than a few percent. People will still need to be able to rent properties, who will provide them?

The problems the OP and many others are facing now are the result of the utterly stupid anti landlord dogma and political interference of the last few years.

To my mind the problem is that successive governments have spent the last few decades telling us that rapidly rising house prices are a good thing, when anyone with half a brain can see that it's not a long-term sustainable situation... and now we've got to the point where it can no longer be sustained but none of the policy makers are willing to say it. To my mind for the market to be healthy, house prices need to roughly halve in the south of England.

A decent family home should not be twenty times the median post-tax annual salary!

I'm surprised it was easier to find places earlier in the year. Mine went on the market in March, had a queue of people to view it on the first day with several offers.

The Landlord and Tenant Act of 1985 states that tenants are entitled to space heating in every room of a property which is capable of maintaining 18 degrees in sleeping rooms at 21 degrees in living spaces with an outside temperature of -1 degrees Celsius; as well as access to both drinkable and hot water.

The Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) Act of 2018 states that landlords must provide "facilities for preparation and cooking of food" but doesn't go into any more details than that. The same act states that "appropriate flooring" must be provided, but that can be bare floorboards as long as they are safe (ie you can't let a house with sharp carpet grippers on the floor but no carpets).

It wouldn't depress prices. There are no more properties available, and still the same amount of households to be housed.

Same with your compulsory purchase idea. How many extra properties would it free up? The answer is none. All you've done is change who has capital tied up in assets. Same tenants need housing.

You can't compulsory purchase at less than market because that's against human rights legislation which Labour are quite keen on.

I'd be happy for a Labour government to cut me a fat cheque for my property. I get better returns from S&S any way and most of it is tax free

It's extremely hard to find a rental property in Germany so this isn't a good example for you.
Point 2 is insane but point 3 shows your goal is simply to punish the landlords, whatever the impact on renters.

Thanks, but the reality is that I could easily be painted as a greedy bd.

The market has moved massively where I have my portfolio in the NW, not a glamourous part of Manchester, just one of the bigger towns on the outskirts, but with very easy access to Manchester and beyond. The rental market has seen prices pretty much double. I can’t give houses away, but when I do rent them I rent them at or around the market rate. Equally, when the 12 month leases come up for renewal a discussion is held about an increase. I don’t like big increases, but I can’t let the market move away too far either. The harsh reality is that I hold all the cards when it comes to that negotiation. The tenant can’t move as the monthly cost locally has skyrocketed, so I can ask for what would have been a big increase. However, I try to strike a balance again and find a midpoint with an understanding of what’s coming the following year, not a fixed amount but an understanding of what split between their current rent and market rent is likely to be asked for.

Of course, it will be more difficult for me to move them on if they disagree, but I can always sell the house, or at least try to and then re let it a few months down the line even under the new legislation. I don’t want to do that and I’d always rather be fair, but if the law is becoming so strict, then I will become less moderate in my approach too.

All this has been driven by populist poorly thought through legislation where a few bad landlords have messed it up for the vast majority of landlords and tenants alike.