Clutching at CGT straws?

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I sold a property in January which I’ve rented out for nearly 30 years, consequently there is a sizeable Capital Gains Tax bill to pay.

I was due to complete on another property in March which would have resulted in a significant loss which I would have used to offset against the other property.

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Minister dashes hopes that new Universal Credit system will see wider use of direct rent payments to landlords

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Despite praising the new online Alternative Payment Arrangements system, Secretary of State Thérèse Coffey has told MPs that she doesn’t want to see a return to the widespread use of directly-paid housing benefit.

Landlords hoping that that the new online Universal Credit direct rent payments system for Alternative Payments Arrangements (APAs) will ease the pain of renting properties to claimants have been dashed by Thérèse Coffey, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.

In a session before a Zoom-hosted parliamentary scrutiny committee yesterday afternoon, she and DWP Change Director Neil Couling were grilled by MPs on a wide range of Universal Credit issues including housing benefit.

They confirmed that some 2,500 APA applications have so far been processed using the new system since mid-May.

Coffey said she welcomed the new system which, as LandlordZONE reported on 14^th May, was developed in partnership with a specialist consultancy, Caridon Landlord Systems.

Online APAs

It enables landlords and tenants to request that the housing portion of Universal Credit payments are diverted directly to the landlord via an APA without the need for any physical paperwork.

But Coffey made clear during the discussions that this system is only for those tenants who ‘really struggling’, rather than being a new and easier way for more landlords to arrange APAs.

Coffey said she didn’t want to see a return to the ‘default’ payment of rent to claimants that had existed before Universal Credit was introduced, and that re-introducing it now would ‘add too much complication’ to the system.

This was a reference to the way Universal Credit payments contract and expand for claimants depending on how much they work, what kind of accommodation they live in and their personal circumstances.

But Neil Couling was more candid about why the new system is unlikely to be rolled out more widely; he said the DWP is still set on compelling claimants to run their own personal finances rather than relying on the state for rent payments, and that the new online system was there only to catch the most distressed cases.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Minister dashes hopes that new Universal Credit system will see wider use of direct rent payments to landlords | LandlordZONE.

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Bank of England mortgage figures take an unsurprising tumble

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The Bank of England have released their money and credit statistics for April: Click here. Unsurprisingly, weakness in the housing market caused by the pandemic emergency resulted in a tumble in April’s mortgage market activity figures.

The number of mortgage approvals for house purchases fell 80% below the February level  to 15,800 ( see chart 4).

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Tenants fallen out and neither will leave?

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I have 2 tenants in my property who each rent a room each and share a communal space. Since living together, they have argued non-stop over really petty things and were contacting me daily to complain about each other.

Finally

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Now Northern Ireland campaigners join national call for eviction ban to be extended

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The country’s Chartered Institute of Housing is calling for a raft of far-reaching measures that it says would protect some 260,000 tenants from losing their homes during the crisis.

Campaigners in Northern Ireland have joined calls on the mainland to extend the Coronavirus evictions ban so that thousands aren’t left homeless and landlords don’t face huge bills.

The Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) NI is suggesting a raft of measures to help the region’s 260,000 renters, including a new evictions ban until they can take place safely, a temporary ban on evictions solely arising from COVID-related arrears and for private tenancies with no fixed term, to stop evictions where no reason is given.

The charity is also calling on the Government to introduce an interest-free loan scheme to cover landlords’ loss of rental income and to require that those given mortgage holidays pass relief on to tenants.

Pay rent

Justin Cartwright,
CIH national director for Northern Ireland, says a key part of the hardship
during the crisis has been the struggle to pay rent and tenants worrying if
they’ll be able to keep their home. He cites unemployment benefit claims in
Northern Ireland rising by almost 90% from 29,700 to 56,200 in April.

Says Cartwright: “We
do not start from a good place. Housing Executive and housing association
resources for dealing with homelessness were stretched before the epidemic and
could be overwhelmed if there’s a sudden growth in evictions due to rent
arrears.”

CIH believes ending
protecting against eviction as a result of courts only listing urgent cases and
the ‘notice to quit period’ extension, could result in a potentially large
number of eviction actions within a short period. He adds: “The burden cannot
simply be put onto landlords. That could lead to defaults on mortgages and
enforced sales, which could deplete the sector just when that capacity is most
needed. This needs Government action too.”

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Now Northern Ireland campaigners join national call for eviction ban to be extended | LandlordZONE.

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300,000 tenants are behind in their rent, claims rental tech platform

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Goodlord has this evening told a national newspaper that the rent default rate in the UK has increased from 4% to 6.6% since the Coronavirus crisis began.

It has been claimed this evening that more than 300,000 renters in the UK – or one in fifteen of its tenants – were in arrears by at least one week last month.

The analysis for a national newspaper by lettings platform Goodlord was based on surveying agents who look after some 16,000 properties across the UK, which found that 6.6% of them were experiencing rental payment problems.

Goodlord says it previous research during April found a rent default rate of 5.8% and that in normal times the rate is 4%, suggesting rent payment problems have been growing in London as the weeks and months of the lockdown have ticked by.

Commenting on the research, Franz Doerr, CEO of rental payments platform Flatfair, says: “As more firms start to furlough staff and others cease trading due to the economic impact of the virus, swathes of young renters up and down the country will see their incomes plummet and may not be able to pay their rent.

“The mounting rent arrears crisis will get worse before it gets better.

“This may, in turn, see many landlords struggling to meet their own obligations such as mortgage repayments.

“Landlords and tenants alike need to be given the space to negotiate repayment plans that ensure that everyone is treated fairly.”

Goodlord has claimed that confusion continues among tenants about whether they have to pay rent, with some asking payment breaks even though they have suffered no financial hardship, and many not realising that landlord mortgage ‘holidays’ are in reality deferment rather than waiver schemes.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – 300,000 tenants are behind in their rent, claims rental tech platform | LandlordZONE.

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iPhone renting app launches that charges landlords £799 per tenancy

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Although landlords may baulk at the cost, Rentd includes all aspects of finding tenants including online marketing, referencing, credit checks, accompanied viewings, rent negotiations and inventories.

A virtual letting agency that enables landlords to manage tenant finding and on-boarding via a smartphone app has launched today for London landlords with plans to expand into Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dubai.

Rentd is only available on via the iPhone App Store where it can be downloaded for free, but charges landlords a fixed fee of £799 per property claiming to find tenants and sign them up in under six days.

The app charges the fee after the tenancy has been signed, sealed and delivered and in return handles and organises the whole tenant on-boarding process.

This includes property marketing, unlimited virtual and accompanied tours, rent offer negotiations, references and credit checks, rental agreements, deposit collection and an inventory service. Co-founder Ahmed Gamal says that, although several websites and digital services offer some of these services, his is the first to encompass them all in one app.

Taxi service

This includes collecting the first month’s rent, while tenants are able to use Rentd to hail an Uber taxi to take them to a viewing, and direct them to it via Waze.

Gamal and co-founder Lawrence Hansford took three years to develop the app and say they feel there has ‘never been a better time to shake-up the market and remove the shackles of the historical way that residential property rentals still operate’.

“The Rentd app manages transactions in a way that we might be familiar with when using eBay or PayPal; these are all breakthrough examples of businesses which have disrupted the status-quo and have brought greater ease and confidence to their respective sectors,” says Gamal.

Rentd soft-launched in February and has been bug-fixing since then prior to the public launch today, but says it already has a substantial number of users. It also offers a full property management service, details of which have yet to be announced publicly.

For more information visit www.rentd.co.uk download the app.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – iPhone renting app launches that charges landlords £799 per tenancy | LandlordZONE.

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Nationwide House Price Index shows impact of Pandemic filtering through

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The Nationwide has just released its House Price index for May showing the effects the coronavirus lockdown is beginning to have on the housing market.

Robert Gardner, Nationwide’s Chief Economist, said: “UK house prices fell by 1.7% over the month in May

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House prices dropped by 1.7% during May, the biggest reduction since 2009

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Nationwide says its figures highlight the inevitable disruption caused by the seven-week property market hiatus following the arrival of the Coronavirus.

House prices slumped by 1.7% during May, the most violent monthly downturn in values since the dark days of the global financial crisis in 2009, lender the Nationwide has reported this morning.

This sharp dip during May means the annual house price inflation has reduced from 3.7% to 1.8%, as has the average house price. It has dipped from £222,915 to £218,902.

Nationwide says the fall is due to a reduction in demand for properties, citing recent government figures that reveal a 53% reduction in property sales during the first four weeks of the pandemic.

Those making offers on properties are in a powerful position and, the Nationwide figures show, price corrections are taking place.

Research by property software Reapit last week revealed that price corrections had increased by 176% since mid-May among vendors as the housing market re-opened.

Extraordinary events

“Though May saw the sharpest fall in prices for over a decade, the extraordinary events of recent months mean that we can be philosophical about such a drop,” says Andrew Montlake, Group Chief Executive of Andrews Property Group.

 “There is clearly a huge
amount of economic uncertainty at present but the drastic steps taken by the
Government to protect the economy, along with interest rates being cut to a
record low, will support the market in the months ahead.

 “It
will be 2021 before the property market finally gets into its stride again but
for now the level of transactions post-lockdown has been staggering.”

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – House prices dropped by 1.7% during May, the biggest reduction since 2009 | LandlordZONE.

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3-month eviction ban extension and their fantasy world

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When the 3-month eviction ban was introduced, it was mentioned that it might be extended if deemed necessary. Predictably, now that the 3-month period is coming to an end, we hear a cacophony of voices – from Shelter, Generation Rent

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