BTL as a pension fund - why not?

[Justayellowbadge]

98elise said:

Try renting through gumtree. I let direct through gumtree and I meet every tenant.

As far as I'm concerned my tenants can stay as long as they want. If they want a long AST they can have it. I also don't inspect the properties, its their home so I don't like to intrude. I see them when any repairs are needed, and thats good enough for me. I also make it clear that after a couple of years I count things like carpets as disposable, I am not going to go over the house with a fine tooth comb looking for ways to steal their deposit.

As to boiler repairs, every one of my BTL's has a brand new good quality boiler, which are fully serviced every year. They wait no more than 24hrs for any essential repair.

My tenants homes get preference over my own for repairs!

It can be a 2 way street, though.

Tenants can often fail to mention issues that don't overly inconvenience them, but lead to painful consequences.

Small bit of damage to a shower door, for instance. Easy fix, the sort of thing a landlord or decent agent would pick up on and sort in a morning.

Or don't, and wonder why, a year later, there's a 3 grand bill for the ceiling that's come down. Or not spending the couple of hundred to clear gutters, as outlined in the tenancy agreement, and incurring an 8 grand bill thanks to the ingress.

It would be a wonderful world if tenants took as much care of the property as you are showing care of your tenants.

[anonymous-user]

economicpygmy said:

Was that me...

Ah, but I believe they are significantly higher than the various estimates so I agree. Its just the ONS population statistics and I dont get along

I know. I never met an economist yet who believed a word the ONS says. I think they must torture you in Economist school with ONS stats.

Anyhow I'll take a leaf out of Mr Louts book and let someone else have a go.

[wolves_wanderer]

aizvara said:

98elise said:

Try renting through gumtree. I let direct through gumtree and I meet every tenant.

As far as I'm concerned my tenants can stay as long as they want. If they want a long AST they can have it. I also don't inspect the properties, its their home so I don't like to intrude. I see them when any repairs are needed, and thats good enough for me. I also make it clear that after a couple of years I count things like carpets as disposable, I am not going to go over the house with a fine tooth comb looking for ways to steal their deposit.

As to boiler repairs, every one of my BTL's has a brand new good quality boiler, which are fully serviced every year. They wait no more than 24hrs for any essential repair.

My tenants homes get preference over my own for repairs!

You sound like a great landlord.

agreed. I wonder if this sort of arrangement will be more common now that families are increasingly renting properties, rather than just the young who tend to move around more?

[heppers75]

wolves_wanderer said:

Oddly I wanted to own a house so that I would have somewhere to live that I knew I couldn't be kicked out of with 2 months notice, was allowed to decorate and didn't have to have people coming in inspecting it every few months. Not to mention paying my own mortgage instead of someone else's. House price inflation doesn't help me if the next house up is more expensive as well.

Don't worry though , we aren't trying to steal your capital gains

And you can, there are literally thousands of houses up and down the UK for sale right now for between £100k-£150k that a FTB could purchase, some within commuting distance of the capital and if you choose not to have a South East centric view of the country then plenty within large towns, cities, villages etc right up through the midlands and beyond.

I really do fail to see the logic in anyone arguing what you are, it is almost like you are saying there simply are not any properties out there for anyone to buy, which is just utter crap!

[tannhauser]

wolves_wanderer said:

LucreLout said:

Gen Y want to own houses rather than rent them so they can benefit from HPI. Whatever else they say is much noise and fury signifying nothing. They want to seize others capital gains so that they can take them for themselves - its just envy, spite, and jealousy. And its as pathetic as it is transparent. They'll just have to curb their expectations and dig deep and work harder for longer.

Put another way, when did anyone last step over a series of homeless gen y'ers freezing in the street? Yeah, me either.

Oddly I wanted to own a house so that I would have somewhere to live that I knew I couldn't be kicked out of with 2 months notice, was allowed to decorate and didn't have to have people coming in inspecting it every few months. Not to mention paying my own mortgage instead of someone else's. House price inflation doesn't help me if the next house up is more expensive as well.

Don't worry though , we aren't trying to steal your capital gains

I concur. What a complete ahole.

[wolves_wanderer]

heppers75 said:

wolves_wanderer said:

Oddly I wanted to own a house so that I would have somewhere to live that I knew I couldn't be kicked out of with 2 months notice, was allowed to decorate and didn't have to have people coming in inspecting it every few months. Not to mention paying my own mortgage instead of someone else's. House price inflation doesn't help me if the next house up is more expensive as well.

Don't worry though , we aren't trying to steal your capital gains

And you can, there are literally thousands of houses up and down the UK for sale right now for between £100k-£150k that a FTB could purchase, some within commuting distance of the capital and if you choose not to have a South East centric view of the country then plenty within large towns, cities, villages etc right up through the midlands and beyond.

I really do fail to see the logic in anyone arguing what you are, it is almost like you are saying there simply are not any properties out there for anyone to buy, which is just utter crap!

I do. I was just giving my reasons for buying which weren't the ones lucrelout was stereotyping us all as having.

[heppers75]

wolves_wanderer said:

heppers75 said:

wolves_wanderer said:

Oddly I wanted to own a house so that I would have somewhere to live that I knew I couldn't be kicked out of with 2 months notice, was allowed to decorate and didn't have to have people coming in inspecting it every few months. Not to mention paying my own mortgage instead of someone else's. House price inflation doesn't help me if the next house up is more expensive as well.

Don't worry though , we aren't trying to steal your capital gains

And you can, there are literally thousands of houses up and down the UK for sale right now for between £100k-£150k that a FTB could purchase, some within commuting distance of the capital and if you choose not to have a South East centric view of the country then plenty within large towns, cities, villages etc right up through the midlands and beyond.

I really do fail to see the logic in anyone arguing what you are, it is almost like you are saying there simply are not any properties out there for anyone to buy, which is just utter crap!

I do. I was just giving my reasons for buying which weren't the ones lucrelout was stereotyping us all as having.

Fairy Snuff... It just was coming across (not just in your post to be fair and in general on this thread) as if it was not possible to buy property because of all the nasty BTL folks, or that the same said nasty BTL folks had pushed up prices to mean that FTB's had no houses to buy themselves and had to rent.

[LucreLout]

tannhauser said:

I concur. What a complete ahole.

I suppose it's marginally better than being half arsed.

[wolves_wanderer]

heppers75 said:

wolves_wanderer said:

heppers75 said:

wolves_wanderer said:

Oddly I wanted to own a house so that I would have somewhere to live that I knew I couldn't be kicked out of with 2 months notice, was allowed to decorate and didn't have to have people coming in inspecting it every few months. Not to mention paying my own mortgage instead of someone else's. House price inflation doesn't help me if the next house up is more expensive as well.

Don't worry though , we aren't trying to steal your capital gains

And you can, there are literally thousands of houses up and down the UK for sale right now for between £100k-£150k that a FTB could purchase, some within commuting distance of the capital and if you choose not to have a South East centric view of the country then plenty within large towns, cities, villages etc right up through the midlands and beyond.

I really do fail to see the logic in anyone arguing what you are, it is almost like you are saying there simply are not any properties out there for anyone to buy, which is just utter crap!

I do. I was just giving my reasons for buying which weren't the ones lucrelout was stereotyping us all as having.

Fairy Snuff... It just was coming across (not just in your post to be fair and in general on this thread) as if it was not possible to buy property because of all the nasty BTL folks, or that the same said nasty BTL folks had pushed up prices to mean that FTB's had no houses to buy themselves and had to rent.

To be fair reading it back it isn't entirely clear.

I don't personally think BTL is especially helpful to first time buyers and I think there are too many amateur landlords who don't have a clue what they're doing, but it is only one factor and pales into insignificance compared to the limited housing supply. There are certainly plenty of places round here and in Leeds where I used to live that are still perfectly within reach of FTB regardless of the best efforts of evil landlords

[anonymous-user]

tannhauser said:

I concur. What a complete ahole.

You accidentally completely disagreed with the last person you concured with

[heppers75]

wolves_wanderer said:

To be fair reading it back it isn't entirely clear.

I don't personally think BTL is especially helpful to first time buyers and I think there are too many amateur landlords who don't have a clue what they're doing, but it is only one factor and pales into insignificance compared to the limited housing supply. There are certainly plenty of places round here and in Leeds where I used to live that are still perfectly within reach of FTB regardless of the best efforts of evil landlords

Is there really any substance to this housing shortage though?

I only ask because in practical terms if I go onto Rightmove and put in Northampton, Bedford, Cambridge or Birmingham and a max price of £150k and then do a search within a 40 mile radius it tops out on every single one and just says more than 1000 results.

I may be being rather simplistic here but if there genuinely was limited supply should we not expect that number to be far smaller? Now I am sure there are all manner of papers, studies and published works on why there is this etherial shortage but there has to come a point where you look at the practical data sat in front of you surely?

It seems to me that there are a whole bunch of people running around giving it the "we're all doomed" attitude and suggesting that there are queues of people waiting to buy FTB type value property and there is none to be had. Yet when you employ some simple ascertation of the facts as they stand in the real world then guess what... houses galore!

If I am missing something then by all means tell me what it is, I am all ears!

[Sonic]

Justayellowbadge said:

Small bit of damage to a shower door, for instance. Easy fix, the sort of thing a landlord or decent agent would pick up on and sort in a morning.

Or don't, and wonder why, a year later, there's a 3 grand bill for the ceiling that's come down.

And here i am jamming towels into the leaky shower door and using a hairdryer on the wall and door downstairs to try and dry out the water and stop my LL's ceiling from coming through

6 months on and they still haven't replaced it despite having had the agent out 4 times and a plumber out twice, because they wont spend a few hundred quid on a new shower door.

If they'd allow me to take on a secure tenancy, say a year or longer, than i'd bloody well fix it myself. But when they insist on 6-months rent upfront every 6 months for a fixed-term then there's not a chance in hell.

Edited by Sonic on Friday 28th November 16:29

[wolves_wanderer]

heppers75 said:

Is there really any substance to this housing shortage though?

I only ask because in practical terms if I go onto Rightmove and put in Northampton, Bedford, Cambridge or Birmingham and a max price of £150k and then do a search within a 40 mile radius it tops out on every single one and just says more than 1000 results.

I may be being rather simplistic here but if there genuinely was limited supply should we not expect that number to be far smaller? Now I am sure there are all manner of papers, studies and published works on why there is this etherial shortage but there has to come a point where you look at the practical data sat in front of you surely?

It seems to me that there are a whole bunch of people running around giving it the "we're all doomed" attitude and suggesting that there are queues of people waiting to buy FTB type value property and there is none to be had. Yet when you employ some simple ascertation of the facts as they stand in the real world then guess what... houses galore!

If I am missing something then by all means tell me what it is, I am all ears!

I dont know tbh. It seems the only logical explanation with a rising population, fewer people in a household and house building not keeping up. There can still be plenty of houses for sale and a shortage, price increases over the last 10-15 years would seem to bear this out.

[pork911]

Sonic said:

And here i am jamming towels into the leaky shower door and using a hairdryer on the wall and door downstairs to try and dry out the water and stop my LL's ceiling from coming through

6 months on and they still haven't replaced it despite having had the agent out 4 times and a plumber out twice, because they wont spend a few hundred quid on a new shower door.

If they'd allow me to take on a secure tenancy, say a year or longer, than i'd bloody well fix it myself. But when they insist on 6-months rent upfront every 6 months for a fixed-term then there's not a chance in hell.

Edited by Sonic on Friday 28th November 16:29

how much more would you pay for such a secure tenancy and if you were really so disatisfied why haven't you moved?

[Sonic]

pork911 said:

Sonic said:

And here i am jamming towels into the leaky shower door and using a hairdryer on the wall and door downstairs to try and dry out the water and stop my LL's ceiling from coming through

6 months on and they still haven't replaced it despite having had the agent out 4 times and a plumber out twice, because they wont spend a few hundred quid on a new shower door.

If they'd allow me to take on a secure tenancy, say a year or longer, than i'd bloody well fix it myself. But when they insist on 6-months rent upfront every 6 months for a fixed-term then there's not a chance in hell.

Edited by Sonic on Friday 28th November 16:29

how much more would you pay for such a secure tenancy and if you were really so disatisfied why haven't you moved?

I'd pay another 5% on-top of my current rent for a 1 year agreement without 6 months upfront. I offered but was rejected by the agency as it didn't meet their insurance criteria. I don't even think it got to the landlord with whom i have no contact.

I'm not dissatisfied with the property, but it does seem odd for me to be more concerned about a trivial problem, such at the one JAYB outlined, than both the agency and the LL when it's not even my property

Besides, i only just moved in 6 months ago... it would cost me another c£3k to move house again and i can quite happily continue to take as many showers as i wish with the problem, but the black mold on the downstairs wall, the soggy plaster on the ceiling and the rotting door frame are only going to get worse...

Edited by Sonic on Friday 28th November 16:53

[pork911]

s1962a said:

pork911 said:

s1962a said:

Because housing is a basic need - whether you rent or buy. If BTL investors push up prices so that owner occupiers have to pay more for the same property had the BTL investor not been in the picture, then that is unfair on them.

presumably you equally advocate a tax on unused spare rooms in owner occupied houses since they are constricting supply thereby increasing house prices and this (along with many other things in life) is 'unfair' on your world view?

Nope. What a person does on a home they are living in is up to them. A home they have bought as an investment - thats what I think should have additional barriers of entry so that it's not a level playing field between owner occupiers and investors.

you don't want a level playing field between two kinds of buyers (strangely ignoring e.g. higher deposits for btl mortgages, tax advantages for owner occupiers etc) on the basis of what exactly? its an investment for the btl landlord but somehow not an investment for owner occupiers??????

any suggested basic need for housing doesn't mean a right to own what you want but cannot afford or even to own anything at all, renting meets that need (but not the 'need' for profiting and climbing the ladder )

[pork911]

Sonic said:

it would cost me another c£3k to move house again

?

[Rovinghawk]

98elise said:

I let direct through gumtree and I meet every tenant.

My existing tenants normally ask on behalf of their friends & we meet up- works well for me.

98elise said:

As far as I'm concerned my tenants can stay as long as they want. If they want a long AST they can have it. I also don't inspect the properties, its their home so I don't like to intrude. I see them when any repairs are needed, and thats good enough for me. I also make it clear that after a couple of years I count things like carpets as disposable, I am not going to go over the house with a fine tooth comb looking for ways to steal their deposit.

As to boiler repairs, every one of my BTL's has a brand new good quality boiler, which are fully serviced every year. They wait no more than 24hrs for any essential repair.

My tenants homes get preference over my own for repairs!

Pretty much the same here. I leave them in peace, they give me an easy time.

Not all landlords are gits.

[Sonic]

pork911 said:

?

What you think the overlap of rent on both properties, floating the deposit for the new place, in this case putting 6 months rent up-front, changing addresses on absolutely everything and all subsequent admin charges plus updating various policies which invariable all now cost more at the new address, service connection charges for the new property, packing consumables plus some time off work to actually pack and physical move house or costs to get a removal man in is free??!?!

[heppers75]

wolves_wanderer said:

heppers75 said:

Is there really any substance to this housing shortage though?

I only ask because in practical terms if I go onto Rightmove and put in Northampton, Bedford, Cambridge or Birmingham and a max price of £150k and then do a search within a 40 mile radius it tops out on every single one and just says more than 1000 results.

I may be being rather simplistic here but if there genuinely was limited supply should we not expect that number to be far smaller? Now I am sure there are all manner of papers, studies and published works on why there is this etherial shortage but there has to come a point where you look at the practical data sat in front of you surely?

It seems to me that there are a whole bunch of people running around giving it the "we're all doomed" attitude and suggesting that there are queues of people waiting to buy FTB type value property and there is none to be had. Yet when you employ some simple ascertation of the facts as they stand in the real world then guess what... houses galore!

If I am missing something then by all means tell me what it is, I am all ears!

I dont know tbh. It seems the only logical explanation with a rising population, fewer people in a household and house building not keeping up. There can still be plenty of houses for sale and a shortage, price increases over the last 10-15 years would seem to bear this out.

Me neither chap and I am possibly applying the wrong logic maybe but there is an element of this that does seem to me to be a bit 'emperor's new clothes' or at least a self fulfilling prophecy because I am not really sure how we can have a shortage of something when there are palpably lots of said something available.