Join us! Watch exclusive LandlordZONE/NRLA Covid update webinar

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LandlordZONE has teamed up with the UK’s largest landlord trade body the NRLA to jointly host a webinar on Tuesday 1^st December that will give landlords a lowdown on Covid and its impact on the housing market and legislation.

Both organisations have worked with renowned industry trainer Susie Crolla from the Guild of Letting and Management to create the webinar, which will begin at 10am.

It will be hosted by the irrepressible Paul Shamplina of Landlord Action and Channel 5’s ‘Nightmare Tenants, Slum Landlords’ TV show.

“This three hour course will be presented in a practical format to help you navigate your responsibilities as a landlord during the coronavirus crisis,” he says.

Susie and Paul will be joined by Ben Beadle, chief executive of the NRLA.

Topics to be covered will include:

• An overview of the impact of COVID-19 on landlords including the changes to eviction notice periods.
• Understanding your legal and compliance responsibilities such as gas and electrical safety, tenant fees and more.
• How to use resources to make the running of your property business easier including how to choose the ideal letting agent.
• An update from the NRLA on the lobbying and financial support currently being worked on including the Renters’ Reform Bill.

“In such unprecedented times we wanted to give back to landlords with a comprehensive webinar that updates and informs them about the Covid crisis from a practical, political, business and property management point of view,” adds Shamplina.

The Being a professional landlord during COVID – legal and compliance update webinar costs £25+VAT. > Click here to book. <

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Join us! Watch exclusive LandlordZONE/NRLA Covid update webinar | LandlordZONE.

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Are These Auction Property Deals Worth it?

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In this video we have a property auction review of some of the best property investment deals coming at auctions Allsop, Acuitus Auction House and Auction House London by myself, Rod Turner, Jay Howard and Piotr Rusinek.

In this episode

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Housing minister dashes hopes of a stamp duty holiday extension

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Landlords banking on the Chancellor to extend his stamp duty holiday and help them either buy or sell properties have had their hopes dashed.

Housing minister Christopher Pincher (pictured) has told parliament that the “government does not plan to extend this relief and will continue to monitor the property market”.

Pincher made the comments in answer to shadow Justice minister Peter Kyle (pictured, below) who was wondering if leaseholders trapped by ongoing cladding scandal would be given more time to sell their homes via the stamp duty ‘nil rate’ band.

But the housing minister went further and said that the stamp duty holiday, which is due to run out on 31^st March next year, was only designed to give the housing market a shot in the arm following the initial Covid lockdown.

Saving anyone buying a property under £500,000 some £15,000 on average, the holiday does not include the additional 3% duty that landlords and second-home owners pay.

Conveyancing delays

Calls for the Chancellor to extend or modify the scheme have been growing lounder in recent weeks as conveyancers have struggled to handle the huge number of property sales that flooded the housing market after the Covid lockdown, and which is still working its way through the system.

This led the Conveyancing Association to warn that any sales agreed after the end of September were unlikely to progress to completion before the cut-off, stranding some 365,000 sales.

Leading industry figures to call on the Chancellor to enable sales agreed to be included within the cut-off date or taper the system to avoid a ‘cliff edge’.

Jeremy Leaf, north London estate agent and a former RICS residential chairman, says: ‘The loss of so many transactions caused by the ending of the stamp duty holiday could have a devastating effect, not just on the property market but the wider economy”.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Housing minister dashes hopes of a stamp duty holiday extension | LandlordZONE.

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Nowhere to hide? Data to shed light on Airbnb and other short lets for first time

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A new monthly analysis of serviced apartments, short-term rentals and hotels is to launch soon that will provide vital details about performance in the sectors and enable government and local authorities to understand what is going on.

The UK Short Term Accommodation Association (STAA) has teamed up with data analytics firm STR to launch a tracking study to measure the three sectors simultaneously.

It will produce monthly and year-to-date performance metrics on occupancy, average daily rate and revenue per available room for hotels, short-term rentals and serviced apartments, as well as information on the average length of stay and cleaning fee per stay of short-term rentals.

STAA chair Merilee Karr (left) says it’s further evidence of the association’s commitment to help the short-term rentals sector grow responsibly and sustainably.

“The data that STR will share with us will give a cross-industry insight that has never been seen before,” says Karr.

“It will allow our members and industry commentators to get a measurable and credible picture on how our sector is growing and on how the different sectors within the industry compare.”

She adds that it will then use this evidence in conversations with Government and local authorities to help with evidenced-based discussions on the sector.

Several of London’s biggest short-term rental operators such as Guest Ready, Seven, Urban Stay and UnderTheDoormat have already been recruited to take part in a pilot in London this month.

Visit the UK Short Term Accommodation Association (STAA)
Read more about the STAA.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Nowhere to hide? Data to shed light on Airbnb and other short lets for first time | LandlordZONE.

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Calls for rent controls intensify as tenants’ union launches manifesto for Scottish election

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Scotland’s tenants’ union is calling for widespread rent controls to level the housing playing field ahead of the country’s May general election.

Living Rent says it’s is a vital opportunity to rebuild a fair, just, affordable housing system for tenants in the wake of the pandemic which has exposed pre-existing fractures.

The group’s new manifesto suggests a points-based system of rent controls linked to the quality and amenities of a property, rather than just market rates.

Its manifesto advocates that rent controls should be tied to the property, rather than the lease, adding: “This would stop landlords being able to hike rents between tenancies and continue to push up market rates.”

Living Rent believes this would incentivise housing providers to maintain and improve their property, while keeping an overall cap on rents.

An independent Scottish Living Rent Commission could then act as mediator while a new Scottish Rent Affordability Index could peg maximum rents at affordable levels for tenants to ensure affordable rents for all.

It says the current measures in place to limit rent increases have failed.

“Stipulations in the legislation mean that three years since rent pressure zones were introduced, no council has been able to implement them,” it adds.

“Even if they were to be introduced, there is no evidence they would be sufficient in tackling the hardship faced by tenants.”

Other suggestions in the manifesto include giving local registered social landlords first refusal on making an offer to buy properties that were privately acquired under right to buy legislation.

Visit Living Rent.
Read more about the existing proposals for rent caps in Scotland currently being scrutinised by its MSPs.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Calls for rent controls intensify as tenants’ union launches manifesto for Scottish election | LandlordZONE.

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New 30 day CGT reporting and split commercial/residential property?

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Can anyone clarify the new rules? UK residents must now declare any Capital Gains due on a residential property within 30 days of completion.

According to the HMRC website, the rules do not apply to Commercial property. My solicitor has said that if any part of a property is rated Commercial then the whole property is deemed Commercial.

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Logistics and industrial property beats retail & leisure by a country mile

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While retail landlords, the likes of Land Securities and Hammerson, have struggled to collect their rents since the outbreak of the pandemic earlier this year, and the collapse in property values and their market capitalisations has been dramatic; logistics is in an entirely different position.

The outlook for retail and leisure was bad enough before the pandemic which brought the British economy to its knees. Over 6,000 stores closed last year. During lockdown and since, with the enforced shutdown of cafes, pubs, restaurants, gyms and hotels is expected to result in thousands more pulling down the shutters for good.

Industrial and logistics landlords, on the other hand, have easily outperformed these other sectors within the commercial property market due to the acceleration in e-commerce. With the likes of with heavyweight LondonMetric its not surprising there’s a big difference. This is, a property development company specialising in industrial and logistics, and with a market capitalisation of around £2bn, it’s reporting a fourth-quarter rent collection rate of 94 per cent.

Not far behind is another big (£11bn) industrial and logistics landlord developer Segro with a UK rent collection rate at 85 per cent of UK rent, ahead of the equivalent date after the second and third-quarter payment deadlines. Its Continental European rents, which are paid monthly, are also tracking ahead of previous quarters. Total rent collection for the second and third quarters stands at 96 and 95 per cent, respectively.

The company is on course to improve further during the fourth quarter, as it continued to deploy £680m in funds raised for expansion in June. The FTSE 100 listed REIT placed 82million shares, representing 7.5% of its issued ordinary share capital, to accelerate pre-let developments as well as acquisitions of land and investment assets, and it is eyeing £1bn worth of deals over the next year and a half.

The group also completed the purchase of Electra Business Park in east London from Schroders the investment fund and invested a further £29m in its own land bank, in line with its target to invest more than £800m in its development pipeline this year.

Increasing rent premiums that can be demanded by logistics properties currently on the market mean the group can invest with confidence, knowing that it can generate higher returns by developing its own assets, even though speculative development comes with more risk.

The company is flying high, but it has not come out entirely unscathed through Covid-19, with rent roll growth from existing space standing at £7.9m, net of space handed back, behind the £10.6m it achieved at the same time last year.

However, investors in the company should take comfort from the fact that the rate at which new headline rents have been agreed on review and renewal, so for this year, have been 10 per cent higher than previous passing rents.

Shares in Segro are trading at or near all time highs, given the prospect of continued rental income and therefore dividend growth.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Logistics and industrial property beats retail & leisure by a country mile | LandlordZONE.

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Stop chasing rogue landlords, says influential new PRS report

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A new report into the private rented sector in the North of England has panned national and local government efforts to clamp down on ‘rogue landlords’ and called for greater efforts by authorities to ensure the majority of ‘good’ landlords maintain their properties adequately.

“A focus on rogue landlords ignores poor practice and a lack of resilience in the private sector more broadly,” it says.

Many tenants quizzed in the study said their landlords were ‘reasonable and non-exploitative’ and that problems came from a lack of inertia and awareness rather than malice.

Called ‘Lockdown, Rundown, Breakdown’ and backed by a foundation financed by the Nationwide building society and published by the Northern Housing Consortium, it says the problems with housing quality are more acute in the North because of its stock of pre-war, low-value properties.

Covid problems

Based on tenant interview by Huddersfield University researchers, it says: “Many longstanding repair and quality issues were described as worsening throughout lockdown because social distancing measures prohibited contractors from entering the home.

“It was only in extreme cases, such as the breakdown of heating systems, that contractors typically carried out work.”

But the key issue identified is that tenants are under-reporting repairs and maintenance issues because they feel insecure in their tenancies.

“The research points to a need for policy makers to campaign for the reintroduction of the ban on evictions and the need for all organisations to adopt fair-minded and just debt enforcement and debt recovery practices,” the report says.

“It also further supports calls to provide all renters with security of tenure as a necessary step to ensure that renters have confidence to exercise their tenancy rights around repairs and maintenance – this should be a legislative priority.”

Read the full report.
Read more about rogue landlords.

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Guidance to help prevent care leavers becoming homeless

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New guidance for councils to help ensure care leavers have the stable homes they need and prevent them from becoming homeless has been published by Minister for Rough Sleeping and Housing Kelly Tolhurst.

Care leavers can often struggle to cope with the challenges of living independently at a young age without a family network

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Potential Commission Dispute?

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I am seeking some views as to whether I am likely to end up with a commission dispute when selling my house.

The circumstances are that I had my house marketed on a sole agency agreement with an estate agent from January to June.

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