OPINION: Why banning HMOs is just another form of local NIMBY-ism

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People outside the PRS often complain that HMOs are its ‘dirty little secret’.

And at a superficial level, it’s true. The deluge of bad stories about poor property management and rule breaking, not to mention the all-too-frequent tragic house fires, means HMO landlords are reported as ‘Scrooges’ lacking the decency to manage their properties in a way that meets minimum standards.

In some cases, this is true. But HMOs are much more complicated than that, as anyone who runs them will know.

First of all, they serve a purpose. Many tenants in HMOs are there because they either can’t afford the traditional shared houses or studio apartments on the market aimed at young professionals or can’t find letting agents or landlords who will give them tenancies for anything else.

They also offer financial certainty – many HMO tenants often work in trades that still pay weekly wages in cash, so once a tenant has paid their rent on the Friday, they know how much money they have left to last them until the next payday.

The problem with HMOs, and it’s a growing one, is that the huge number of tenants with these needs is pushing HMOs into more affluent areas, relatively speaking.

Local campaigns

And that has created the phenomenon of the ‘anti-HMO campaign’ of which I have seen, and reported on, increasingly during 2021.

In many areas local campaigns have successfully lobbied councillors to curb or control HMOs either through tighter planning laws or additional licensing schemes.

But in reality, it’s a form of nimby-ism. The need for HMOs is a result of wider societal and wealth issues rather than a cause of them, but rather than tackle these problems, most people want to kick them, literally, down the road via licensing or planning restrictions.

This is similar to campaigns against new homes in an area, often led by people who simultaneously grumble their children can’t afford to buy there without seeing the cause and effect.

In both cases, they boil down to the same problem – the UK’s housing market is struggling to cope with people’s ever-growing and changing needs, whether it’s more starter homes or the need for more rented, affordable shared living accommodation. Just don’t blame the landlords who are battling to provide the latter.

Nigel Lewis is editor of LandlordZONE.

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Get your accounts sorted before the end of the tax year

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With the 2021/22 tax year coming to an end and the 31st of January ITSA deadline looming, now is a good time to be looking at ways and solutions to improve your accounting.

What happens if you file late?

If you miss the deadline for your self-assessment submission or pay your tax bill late you will face a penalty.

The penalty currently for a missed or late filing is £100 for filings up to 3 months late. This penalty increases should you file later even later than the three months. On top of the £100 penalty, you will be charged interest on your late payments so that your tax bill accumulates further.

You can get an estimate of exactly how much your penalty will be here.

What can you do to improve your rental property bookkeeping?

Keeping accurate up-to-date records throughout the tax year is essential if you want to file an accurate and timely self-assessment. However, keeping comprehensive records of all of your income and expenses can be a tedious task at best. This often leads to landlords and real estate investors putting off accounting tasks and admin tasks to the end of the year.

By leaving it to the last minute in this way they open themselves up to costly errors and it can make the tax season far more tedious than it needs to be.

Employ cloud accounting and digital record keeping

If you’re not already, an idea is to explore cloud accounting solutions for your buy to lets. This allows you to update your books easily on a regular basis so that you avoid the buildup of a large admin task. On top of this, your accounts can easily be shared with your accountant or financial advisor, and, as an added benefit, it will give you greater clarity and oversight of your financials.

Operate your rentals as a business

Over the last few years, the government have made it clear that they want landlords and investors to operate in a more professional manner. They have introduced new regulations, reduced allowable expenses, and generally made it harder for small portfolio landlords to make a profit.

To stay compliant and file an accurate and timely tax self-assessment, landlords need to operate their rentals like any other business. This means accurate and regular accounting, comprehensive paperwork, and clear financial oversight.

Not only will this make it easier to file your end of year assessment, but it’ll make it easier to generate a profit, get new financing, and prepare financially for future changes such as the increase in minimum EPC rating and making tax digital.

How can software like Landlord Studio help?

Take advantage of open banking innovations

Open banking Innovations make it easy for software to connect to your bank account so that you can easily view and reconcile transactions in real-time. With Landlord Studio, you can link the relevant bank account and with a few quick clicks reconcile income and expenses against the relevant property. This reduces manual data entry, saving time and reducing potential errors.

Digitise receipts at the point of sale

In order to stay HMRC compliant, you need to keep all of your related receipts. However, paper receipts fade and can easily get lost or misplaced. With Landlord Studio you can easily digitise your receipts using the app. The software will then read the receipt details and enter them into the expense for you.

Manage your bookkeeping on the go

We’ve already mentioned that allowing your accounting tasks to build up can lead to accounting errors which compound errors, and a lengthy and tedious task to organise everything at the end of the tax year. A better and more practical way to keep your books is to use cloud accounting software with an app. This allows you to update your books on the go at any point in time. Meaning you can log income and expenses as they happen in real-time and ensure nothing gets missed.

Easy date access and visualisation

When it comes to filing your taxes you need to be able to easily access your dater. Landlord Studio offers comprehensive accountant approved reporting. Simply selective the report you want adjust the customisable filters and hit “run report”. This can be done on any device. Plus, you can use our dashboard for quick financial insights.

Final words and notes on upcoming tax changes: Making Tax Digital

As your portfolio of buy to let properties expands so too does the amount of admin required. Having a system for keeping detailed records of all your income and expenses will not only make tax time easier but also allow you to gain clear oversight of your portfolio.

Swapping from paper and spreadsheets to a rental property accounting system will save you time. More importantly, though, it will help you keep everything organised helping you identify weak points in your business so that you can increase profits.

On top of this, with the new MTD regulations coming into effect in 2024 landlords need to be keeping digital records just to stay compliant. If you continue to use spreadsheets or unapproved software you will also need bridging software in order to submit your records to the HMRC.

Find out how Landlord Studio can help you today

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Get your accounts sorted before the end of the tax year | LandlordZONE.

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Updated advice for landlords on Right to Rent checks due in New Year

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The government is set to publish advice about how landlords will need to conduct Right to Rent checks after 5^th April.

From that date, Biometric Residence Card (BRC), Biometric Residence Permit (BRP) and Frontier Worker Permit (FWP) holders will only be able to evidence their Right to Rent using the Home Office online service – a physical document will no longer be accepted as valid proof.

Currently, tenants can choose whether to provide hard copy documents or a digital share code, but this will change for these specific groups in April.

The government has already reassured landlords and letting agents that they won’t need to retrospectively check the status of these renters who entered into a tenancy agreement up to and including 5^th April.

Civil penalty

Landlords will have a statutory excuse against any civil penalty if the initial checks were done in line with the guidance that applied at the time the check was made.

Since 2015, landlords have been required to check that all prospective tenants have lawful immigration status in the UK before entering a residential tenancy in England, to avoid a fine.

This new rule aims to reduce the work involved and to minimise the scope for human error or criminal abuse of the system.

To carry out an online Right to Rent check, landlords need the applicant’s date of birth and their share code, which they will have obtained online, or they can arrange for an agent to carry out checks on their behalf if they have an existing written agreement.

The most up-to-date government guide – Right to Rent Checks: A user guide for tenants and landlords – was published in September.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Updated advice for landlords on Right to Rent checks due in New Year | LandlordZONE.

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UK’s leading tech hubs attracting record investment and jobs

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Government research is finding huge growth in venture capital investment and jobs in Britain’s leading tech hub cities, post Brexit.

According to new research, the UK technology sector attracted a record £29.4bn in investment during 2021, with Cambridge, Manchester, Oxford, Edinburgh and Leeds leading the pack.

Private venture capital has been a major source of this new funding, venture capitalists entrusting new companies with their cash, taking stakes in them that has given the sector a huge boost. Now more than double last year’s total of £11.5bn has been invested.

The Unicorns are coming

The number of companies worth $1bn (£750m), known in the industry as “unicorns”, has now increased to 116, a record high for the UK, that’s according to figures published by the government’s Digital Economy Council. This record figure dwarfs the comparable ones for France (31) and Germany (56), according to the DEC.

The drive to boost activity outside the capital and into the regions reflects the Government’s levelling-up agenda and it appears to be paying dividends for those cities with the necessary labour, housing and educational institutions exist.

Cambridge has been declared the leading regional tech city in the UK, just ahead of Manchester and Oxford. Edinburgh, Bristol, Leeds, Cardiff, Newcastle and Belfast also feature in the top 10.

Job creation

Gerard Grech, the chief executive of Tech Nation, a government-backed industry group reported by The Guardian Newspaper has said:

“The UK is very good at rearing and cultivating startups and scale-ups into successful global companies right across the UK. A true network of digital excellence is emerging right across the country through entrepreneurship, driving new job and wealth creation.”

Other research shows that these developments are leading to burgeoning job opportunities. In Manchester for example, tech jobs are said to have increased by 165% while Edinburgh pays the highest tech job salaries outside of London.

Tech job search engine Adzuna’s co-founder, Andrew Hunter, told the Guardian, that while there had been a “surge” in tech hiring across the UK, there is still a major problem in finding skilled staff. “The struggle for businesses across the country is having enough skilled staff to fill these positions to allow them to keep growing.”

Fastest growing

Bristol for example was named one of the fastest-growing tech hubs with firms in the city attracting more than £100m in venture capital funding during 2021. Research for the DEC ranked Bristol in the top five of a ‘Tech Power League’ table of cities, behind Cambridge, Manchester, Oxford and Edinburgh.

The DEC analysis shows that Bristol has over 3,000 tech job opportunities, a rise of more than 50% rise since November 2020, and with some of the highest salary opportunities outside of London. The number of Unicorn companies is expected to double in Bristol over over the next few years from three to six.

Aerospace companies feature on on the list in Bristol as do e-commerce companies like Huboo, and Biotech firms such as Open Bionics and the touchless technology firm Ultraleap all expected to reach the magic valuation in the near future.

Firms in the UK’s regional cities accounted for a larger proportion of the national total, with around £9bn of funding being awarded to start-ups and scale-ups outside of London.

Nigel Toon, co-founder and chief executive at Graphcore, based in Bristol, told Businesslive:

“There is no longer any debate over whether you can build a multi-billion dollar tech business in the UK. The investments made over the past few years into start-ups and scale-ups across the country are producing outstanding results and I look forward to seeing how ecosystems like Bristol’s grow and thrive over many years to come.”

Digital minister Chris Philp says:

“It’s been another record-breaking year for UK tech with innovative British start-ups helping solve some of the world’s biggest challenges.

“Capitalising on this fantastic investment across the country is a crucial part of our mission to level up, so we are supporting businesses with pro-innovation policies and helping people to get the skills they need to thrive in this dynamic industry.”

Digital Economy Council’s Levelling Up Power Tech League 2021

• Cambridge
• Manchester
• Oxford
• Edinburgh
• Bristol
• Leeds
• Birmingham
• Newcastle
• Cardiff
• Belfast

The increasing employment prospects in the leading UK cities is good news for landlords, with growing demand for quality housing and commercial units, offices, warehousing and industrial space.

[Image shows Clifton Suspension Bridge, Bristol]

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – UK’s leading tech hubs attracting record investment and jobs | LandlordZONE.

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LATEST: Scottish Government sets out its controversial rental reform plans

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Scotland has launched plans for an overhaul of its rented sector that include a controversial system of rent controls.

Proposals also include increasing penalties for illegal evictions, restricting evictions during winter, giving tenants greater flexibility to keep pets, introducing a new Housing Standard and PRS regulator and setting minimum standards for energy efficiency.

The government’s new deal for tenants promises to deliver stronger rights and a fairer rented sector that welcomes responsible landlords.

Tenants’ Rights Minister Patrick Harvie (main pic) explains that the proposals will significantly improve the lives of Scotland’s tenants in both private and social housing, giving them more stability, more choice over where they live and how they decorate their homes, and the confidence that their home will be of high quality.

Responsible landlords

“At the same time, it will recognise the interests of good quality, responsible landlords,” says Harvie. “We will be working in partnership with landlords, letting agents, tenants and others to deliver this strategy, and we want to gather the broadest range of views.”

However, David Alexander (pictured), CEO of estate and letting agency DJ Alexander, believes rent controls have never worked anywhere and invariably lead to fewer properties on the market and more housing shortages.

“It is important to remember that landlords and property investors can go elsewhere,” he says.

“If the approach to resolving Scotland’s housing shortage is simply to attack one part of the sector, then there is every likelihood of failure. The alternative to inclusivity could lead to a shortage of housing and a consequent slowing of economic growth.”

The results of a government consultation – which closes on 15^th April – will feed into the final version of the strategy to be published next year, with elements of the proposals put to the Scottish Parliament in a Housing Bill in 2023.

The rent control proposals set out reforms to the existing rent adjudication process, and the government will gather evidence to inform a future consultation specifically on these controls.

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A national system of rent controls is a key aim of consultation

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The Scottish Government is consulting on the draft ‘A New Deal for Tenants’  to propose a rented sector strategy looking to improve accessibility, affordability choices and standards across the whole rented sector in Scotland. Click here

It is looking at a phased implementation over the next five years.

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Management Agent Overcharging from 2019?

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Dear All, I own a flat in a block of 6 flats and have been up-to-date with my service charge. Every so often, I get an extra fee called “balancing service charge” after which I had made payment for the annual service charge

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