Rental market is utterly broken

[DonkeyApple]

Chumley.mouse said:

Awesome……you could get bladdered , pick a lady up and straight upstairs.

Offer a monthly dinner and beer package to lift the remainder of the income, with discounts for bringing friends in. You could get a nice little racket going where everyone's a winner.

People are creating 'digital nomad' houses in the same way by taking over old B&bs in dead towns and offering room rental with downstairs working space.

[Red9zero]

Chumley.mouse said:

Awesome……you could get bladdered , pick a lady up and straight upstairs.

Not quite. The pub is closed (again). I assume they are slowly turning it into an HMO.

[98elise]

BoostMonkey said:

LF5335 said:

Government announcement of a GE ends all government business IIRC. Is that the end of the proposed Renters Bill. Section 21 etc gets a new lease of life?

I'm sure most people are assuming if Labour get in they will scrap S21 as soon as they can.
The question is how far will they go with things like rent controls.....

It's was never going to be fully scrapped, and I doubt Labour will fully scrap it either.

Section 21 covers things like wanting to sell, wanting to live in the property yourself, and wanting it back for a family member. It can only be used after the original tenancy period is over, and all of those reasons are valid.

[Pit Pony]

I rent out a 3 bed semi in L23.

Current tenant pays £750 per month. We put the rent up in September.

We have just paid out £2k on the roof, and £3.5k on a new boiler. (Things wear out and we put money aside for this sort of ste)

Now, in L23 there isn't an equivalent house for rent less than £1000.

To get a 3 bed house for the same price, you need to look at "Beruit" (no offence to anyone in bootle or Netherton, or Croxteth)

Wife doesn't want to put the rent up too much because the current tenant might not be able to afford it. And might leave. So fking what ? We are giving away £2k a year vs the going rate, so the loss of 2 weeks rent whilst we fill it...meh.
I understand the concept that it's better the devil you know.....but.......

Given a labour government is coming and rent controls are seen as a political masterstroke, I think we give notice at the start of July, that the rent will be £955.

Any positive views on this ?

[LF5335]

98elise said:

It's was never going to be fully scrapped, and I doubt Labour will fully scrap it either.

Section 21 covers things like wanting to sell, wanting to live in the property yourself, and wanting it back for a family member. It can only be used after the original tenancy period is over, and all of those reasons are valid.

I’ve just served S21 on some tenants, because they were becoming far too high maintenance. Basically breaking everything they didn’t like and immediately insisting it be repaired. Managing agents about as useful as a chocolate fire guard so they had to go. Their contract is up in July so this was coincidentally the right time to serve it.

No need to give a reason and no intention of doing so, just let them know I want possession back and on what date along with some standard wording.

It’s arguably harsh, but without that option then I’ll offload the houses now as tenancies end rather than renew as it’s just too big a risk for me to carry. Rental prices in the immediate vicinity continue to rocket and are now 130% higher than they were in 2019.

Tenants have a lot of rights. Almost too many and I’ve reached a stage where it appears they are too demanding and want everything perfect immediately as of I’ve got an army of plumbers, electricians, gas engineers etc on call 24/7 to do their bidding.

[AdamV12V]

If anyone is interested my brother and I are selling up our portfolio of BTL properties. We have one left which is on the market now, in Leeds, Hunslet area.

Its generating a gross yield of 14.7% on the latest rent increase. We are selling as we never intended to become landlords, properties were inherited and now be both would like the cash out for home renovation projects.

PM me for more details, if you are interested. I wont post the link here for obvious reasons.

Regards

[98elise]

Olivera said:

BoostMonkey said:

The question is how far will they go with things like rent controls.....

Quite far I'm hoping. With additional contributory measures such as reducing net immigration figures, increasing house building (with sensible liberalisation of planning), and reforming council tax.

What sort of controls are you hoping for?

Do you think the outcome will be different to Scottish rent controls?

[EmBe]

Pit Pony said:

I rent out a 3 bed semi in L23.

Current tenant pays £750 per month. We put the rent up in September.

We have just paid out £2k on the roof, and £3.5k on a new boiler. (Things wear out and we put money aside for this sort of ste)

Now, in L23 there isn't an equivalent house for rent less than £1000.

To get a 3 bed house for the same price, you need to look at "Beruit" (no offence to anyone in bootle or Netherton, or Croxteth)

Wife doesn't want to put the rent up too much because the current tenant might not be able to afford it. And might leave. So fking what ? We are giving away £2k a year vs the going rate, so the loss of 2 weeks rent whilst we fill it...meh.
I understand the concept that it's better the devil you know.....but.......

Given a labour government is coming and rent controls are seen as a political masterstroke, I think we give notice at the start of July, that the rent will be £955.

Any positive views on this ?

Having had a few rentals (but now out of that, thankfully) I would say it only takes one properly st tenant to make life stressful.

It quite often is 'better the devil you know' in terms of stress but also regular rent - bad tenants also have a habit of stopping payment.
Perhaps increase the rent by a smaller amount and make sure your tenant knows you could put it up more but you'd rather keep them...?

[KTMsm]

I don't understand

If there is a shortage of rentable properties, how does giving tenants more rights and reducing landlords profits, meaning more leave the market, reducing supply

How does that help renters ?

[ATG]

KTMsm said:

I don't understand

If there is a shortage of rentable properties, how does giving tenants more rights and reducing landlords profits, meaning more leave the market, reducing supply

How does that help renters ?

In isolation, it doesn't, but where some of those renters are only renting because they're trying to buy, having landlords exit the market increases the supply of dwellings for sale.

Moving landlords in and out of the market doesn't change the number of dwellings. The number of renters isn't fixed.

But ... really we're looking at two completely different problems. There's a big shortage of the dwellings that people want to live in in the locations they want. Makes bugger all difference if it's rental or owned; there's just a shortage of physical dwellings and we're buggered until that problem is addressed. And then there's the separate problem of security of tenure where there's an argument that tenants should be able to have greater certainty.

[davek_964]

Pit Pony said:

Given a labour government is coming and rent controls are seen as a political masterstroke, I think we give notice at the start of July, that the rent will be £955.

Any positive views on this ?

In the short term, I'm not sure a labour government will be good for renters.

My agency suggested I put the rent up in April (1 year into a 2 year tenancy) but I declined. They've not been bad tenants so I thought I'd leave it.
But a labour government will probably mean I (give notice to) increase the rent immediately after the election.

I doubt we'll be a small minority doing that........

[Biggy Stardust]

davek_964 said:

Pit Pony said:

Given a labour government is coming and rent controls are seen as a political masterstroke, I think we give notice at the start of July, that the rent will be £955.

Any positive views on this ?

In the short term, I'm not sure a labour government will be good for renters.

My agency suggested I put the rent up in April (1 year into a 2 year tenancy) but I declined. They've not been bad tenants so I thought I'd leave it.
But a labour government will probably mean I (give notice to) increase the rent immediately after the election.

I doubt we'll be a small minority doing that........

I put all my rents up today as I think any future government will make this more difficult.

[davek_964]

Biggy Stardust said:

davek_964 said:

Pit Pony said:

Given a labour government is coming and rent controls are seen as a political masterstroke, I think we give notice at the start of July, that the rent will be £955.

Any positive views on this ?

In the short term, I'm not sure a labour government will be good for renters.

My agency suggested I put the rent up in April (1 year into a 2 year tenancy) but I declined. They've not been bad tenants so I thought I'd leave it.
But a labour government will probably mean I (give notice to) increase the rent immediately after the election.

I doubt we'll be a small minority doing that........

I put all my rents up today as I think any future government will make this more difficult.

I'll sleep on it, but perhaps that is the sensible thing to do.

[KTMsm]

ATG said:

But ... really we're looking at two completely different problems. There's a big shortage of the dwellings that people want to live in in the locations they want.

Makes bugger all difference if it's rental or owned; there's just a shortage of physical dwellings and we're buggered until that problem is addressed.

And then there's the separate problem of security of tenure where there's an argument that tenants should be able to have greater certainty.

A shortage of dwellings primarily created by a population explosion and strict planning rules - albeit building on fields when we already can't grow enough food to support our existing population, seems foolish

With the costs and requirements to buy a home, I think it very much matters that there are enough rental units too

Good tenants tend to have certainty - why would you kick a good tenant out ? Only if they aren't paying market rent, why should landlords subsidise tenants ?

It's like the current situation where the Council won't rehome people until they are literally thrown out by court order, despite in many cases them having not paid rent for months

The rules ought to be fair to both parties

[98elise]

davek_964 said:

Biggy Stardust said:

davek_964 said:

Pit Pony said:

Given a labour government is coming and rent controls are seen as a political masterstroke, I think we give notice at the start of July, that the rent will be £955.

Any positive views on this ?

In the short term, I'm not sure a labour government will be good for renters.

My agency suggested I put the rent up in April (1 year into a 2 year tenancy) but I declined. They've not been bad tenants so I thought I'd leave it.
But a labour government will probably mean I (give notice to) increase the rent immediately after the election.

I doubt we'll be a small minority doing that........

I put all my rents up today as I think any future government will make this more difficult.

I'll sleep on it, but perhaps that is the sensible thing to do.

You don't have to rush. Bringing in rent controls takes time so its not happening immediately after the election.

If your rent is significantly below market they it would be advisable to start increasing it though so that your tenants don't get a sudden huge rise.

We put ours up last year, and warned of bigger rises this year. Rents still seems to be heading north though, and I'm now getting calls from local estate agents asking about any rentals coming up. They are desperate for stock.

[98elise]

AdamV12V said:

If anyone is interested my brother and I are selling up our portfolio of BTL properties. We have one left which is on the market now, in Leeds, Hunslet area.

Its generating a gross yield of 14.7% on the latest rent increase. We are selling as we never intended to become landlords, properties were inherited and now be both would like the cash out for home renovation projects.

PM me for more details, if you are interested. I wont post the link here for obvious reasons.

Regards

If mine were 14% I'd be buying more, not selling! Are they older properties?

[davek_964]

98elise said:

You don't have to rush. Bringing in rent controls takes time so its not happening immediately after the election.

If your rent is significantly below market they it would be advisable to start increasing it though so that your tenants don't get a sudden huge rise.

Mine is about market value - it only started being rented in April '23, so this would only be an annual rise to keep it in line

[LooneyTunes]

davek_964 said:

Biggy Stardust said:

davek_964 said:

Pit Pony said:

Given a labour government is coming and rent controls are seen as a political masterstroke, I think we give notice at the start of July, that the rent will be £955.

Any positive views on this ?

In the short term, I'm not sure a labour government will be good for renters.

My agency suggested I put the rent up in April (1 year into a 2 year tenancy) but I declined. They've not been bad tenants so I thought I'd leave it.
But a labour government will probably mean I (give notice to) increase the rent immediately after the election.

I doubt we'll be a small minority doing that........

I put all my rents up today as I think any future government will make this more difficult.

I'll sleep on it, but perhaps that is the sensible thing to do.

You would not be alone in doing so. We have a number that have lagged behind market increases (which we've been OK with) but if rent increases are going to be capped we may need to revisit the levels they're set at.

[DonkeyApple]

KTMsm said:

A shortage of dwellings primarily created by a population explosion and strict planning rules - albeit building on fields when we already can't grow enough food to support our existing population, seems foolish

I don't think tying food security in to the debate makes any sense. The U.K. has always imported food because it is excessively affluent for the landmass it has to exist upon. The recent belief amongst corners of the public that somehow the entire population of the U.K. needs to be able to exist on home grown root vegetables is a political construct to goad the elderly into doing the bidding of others.

So let's just focus on the shortage of dwellings being primarily created by a population explosion.

Which explosion is this? We have a jump above the norm in a year after two years of running significantly below the norm. That seems to have seriously distressed the elderly. Meanwhile, on planet normal, we can see the pop growth has been increasing slowly over the last couple of decades but around the 500k mark. We can also see that we've been building around 250k/annum new properties. So the question to be asking is why are all the new 500k people a year all living alone? How are newborn babies suddenly calling up estate agents and buying a house to live in on their own? Why is every migrant and their family all living in individual properties?

When we actually start to think rationally we start to see that this is more of a household structural change issue meeting a grotesque failing of local council to enforce their own rules on the delivery of affordable homes. With significant peripheral issues such as the massive growth of leveraged landlords who are too indebted to not have rents track debt costs rather than traditionally tracking wages of the tenants.

Population growth either through not enough people dying, too many being born, not enough people emigrating or too many people arriving plays a role but it's not the core reason just the default excuse.

[LF5335]

davek_964 said:

Mine is about market value - it only started being rented in April '23, so this would only be an annual rise to keep it in line

You should always increase rents annually even if it’s a nominal £25pm. It just makes it known to the tenants that rent rises annually, rather than then getting used to it being static then injecting massively at any rise. It also helps to remove the need for larger increases.