Aug

MARKET: Rents hit historic high of £1,367 a month as void periods plunge

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The average rent for a property in the UK has hit a historic high of £1,367 a month, helping push void periods between tenancies down to their lowest ever, an average of nine days.

These extraordinary figures are within the latest Goodlord renting index, which uses data from tens of thousands of tenancies arranged though its platform each month.

Its average national rent figure of £1,367 is the highest level ever recorded by the Index and is 9.4% higher than the previous record, set in September 2022, of £1,249.

It is also 19% higher than the month before and 10% higher year-on-year.

These figures will prompt campaigning groups to warn the government, as they have before, that the private rented sector is dangerously unbalanced, over-run by a glut of tenants unable to get on the property ladder and dogged by stock levels reduced by more landlords than usual exiting the sector.

Staggering

“This month’s numbers are quite staggering,” says William Reeve, CEO of Goodlord (pictured).

“In July we do usually expect to see an increase in rents and a reduction in voids – and all indicators pointed to a particularly red hot summer for the rental market, if not the weather.

“So while the 10% year-on-year increase is a big shift, the sharp drop in void periods is also particularly surprising.

“Digging into the data, we can see a large number of multiple occupancy student lets being confirmed during July, which has pushed up average prices in key regions such as the North East and South West.

“Traditionally, rental costs continue to increase until September before cooling off in the autumn, which could mean these aren’t the last records we’ll see broken before the year is out.”

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