Monthly house price growth slows to 0.3% for June

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The latest Nationwide House price index for June is reporting a slowing inflationery market with month-on-month property prices up 0.3% in June – down from 0.9% in May.

However, Annual inflation is still in double digits at 10.7% with the average house price now standing at £271,613.

View Full Article: Monthly house price growth slows to 0.3% for June

Daily Telegraph needs assistance from Holiday Let landlords

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I wondered if you might please be able to post the below request on the Property118 forum for a piece I am writing on holiday lets?

Hello, my name is Rachel Mortimer and I’m a property reporter at the Daily Telegraph.

View Full Article: Daily Telegraph needs assistance from Holiday Let landlords

Scottish eviction reforms need scrutiny

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The Scottish Government is aiming to sign into law Part 4 of the Coronavirus Bill (Recovery and Reform) (Scotland). The legislation would permanently make all grounds for eviction discretionary, meaning a tribunal would not have to automatically remove a tenant in cases of anti-social behaviour

View Full Article: Scottish eviction reforms need scrutiny

Confusion about HMO definition?

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Hi All, I will soon become a property owner and I wanted to rent out two rooms to help with the mortgage and bills.

I live in Croydon (where full planning permission is required for any kind of HMO) I must be careful to not hit the threshold for an HMO.

View Full Article: Confusion about HMO definition?

Seek heating advice to help keep energy costs in check

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Landlords should ask plumbers what they can do to get their properties heat pump ready without necessarily ditching the gas boiler, advises a top energy expert.

Speaking on the Hamilton Fraser property podcast, Rik Smith, head of tenancy services at Goodlord, said although they didn’t need to think about switching immediately, they could consider doing more insulation or fitting larger radiators so the boiler could be set at 50 degrees rather than 70 or 80 degrees, to provide a consistent lower temperature.

Boiler dimensions

“A boiler needs to be the correct size to run efficiently,” he told listeners. “Fitting a 30kw boiler to a two-bed semi is too big and it will run inefficiently. Another tip is that if you have a hot water tank in a house, don’t be tempted to replace it now with a combi boiler. In the future, it will be to your advantage to store water so you’ll need a water tank.”

Smith also advised landlords to reach out to tenants who might be struggling with higher energy bills by telling them about available support, such as The Warm Home Discount Scheme. “The sooner you get sight that your tenant is struggling to pay, the sooner you can help them by asking if they’ve accessed that available money or to offer a payment plan.” He added: “Tenants should talk to energy suppliers who are obliged to help, and the online chat function can be very effective when getting hold of these companies rather than using the phone.”

Storage heaters

Smith expects investment in renewables to accelerate and the demand for electricity to rise. “There will be increasing incentives for households to generate and store electricity,” he said. “There’s an idea that ‘time of use’ tariffs might help you stop using electricity at peak times while some kind of storage heaters might come back.”

Hamilton Fraser has published a guide for landlords to surviving the cost of living crisis.

View Full Article: Seek heating advice to help keep energy costs in check

Scottish landlords must wait weeks to try out new deposit website

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Scotland’s leading tenancy deposit scheme SafeDeposits has been forced to halt plans for its new online portal at the last minute due to technical problems.

The not-for-profit organisation had planned to launch today (29th June) but has had to delay until 18^th July. It now needs to make further checks but promises customers that in the meantime, they can use its old system until 13^th July when it will close the website to allow for the migration of data.

Smooth transition

Mike Smith, head of SafeDeposits Scotland, says: “The delivery of the new system is a project of over two years in the making and we are disappointed to have to temporarily halt proceedings so close to launch, but we have done so in the interests of ensuring a smooth transition. We are sorry for any inconvenience at this time.”

New features include the ability for tenants to create their own SafeDeposits Scotland user account so they can view any of their present and past deposits protected by the scheme in one place, while tenants will have the option to change the lead tenant through their account.

Deposit registered

Landlord details will be tied to properties they have previously registered deposits for, and the system will suggest the correct landlord to add to the deposit when a new deposit is being registered.

The online negotiation process will also be expanded so that – before committing to Alternative Dispute Resolution – parties can adjust their claims and negotiate back and forth via their accounts, while the evidence gathering process will be improved to help ensure evidence submissions are watertight.

View Full Article: Scottish landlords must wait weeks to try out new deposit website

Government review into the effect of short-term holiday lets

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A government review into the effect of short-term holiday lets will seek to improve the holiday letting market for those living in popular tourism destinations.

The scheme, proposed in a new government review looking at the impact of increases in short-term and holiday lets in England

View Full Article: Government review into the effect of short-term holiday lets

LATEST: Manchester reveals more details of its selective licensing expansion

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Manchester aims to double the size of its selective licensing scheme by adding another 1,884 properties in eight areas.

The council has given it the go-ahead to the proposals revealed last year and will now launch a consultation into licensing all private homes in Moss Side: Claremont Road/Great Western St, Levenshulme: Matthews Lane, Longsight: The Royals, Cheetham – Esmond/Avondale, Cheetham: Heywood St/Cheetham Hill Road, Rusholme: Birch Lane, Rusholme: Laindon/Dickenson and Cheetham: flats over shops: Cheetham Hill Road.

It points to the success of its first scheme in Crumpsall which recently ended, where 372 properties were licensed and landlords were fined £36,000 for housing offences.

During inspections, 18% of properties were found to have serious hazards, it served 20 improvement notices, two prohibition notices and two suspended prohibition notices.

Spring 2023 start

There are currently seven live selective licensing areas in the city. If the new areas are approved, landlords there would have to pay for a licence in spring 2023. 

Councillor Gavin White (pictured), executive member for housing and development, says there’s clear evidence from the first scheme in Crumpsall that serious issues have been found.

He adds: “There is no place for rogue landlords in our city – we want those landlords to know that this is unacceptable and we will do everything in our power to bring them to account. These eight new schemes across the city will help us to achieve that.” 

Selective licensing currently covers Moss Side, Moston, Old Moat, The Ladders – Gorton and Abbey Hey, Hyde Road – Gorton and Abbey Hey, Trinity, and Ben Street area – Clayton and Openshaw.

View Full Article: LATEST: Manchester reveals more details of its selective licensing expansion

Students are no ‘Young Ones’ say the landlords happy to deduct for clean-up

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Student renters may be messy but are worth the risk, according to the results of a new survey which dispels some myths around the sector.

A Tenancy Deposit Scheme (TDS) poll of agents and landlords found that 88% have had to raise a deposit deduction at the end of a tenancy. Of those, 48% claimed for damage to property, 36% made a claim for cleaning, 9% deducted for redecoration and 7% experienced rent arrears. However, despite the high percentage of deductions, 60% of those quizzed believed that in general, students took good care of their rental property and 86% would continue to let to students in the future.

Constant redecorating

Of those who did not rent to students, reasons given included: the risk of too much potential damage, potentially causing a problem with neighbours, preference for more reliable professionals in their property, worried about constant redecorating, a belief that students tend to be unclean and irresponsible, hold too many late-night parties and cause elements of anti-social behaviour.

Sandy Bastin, TDS head of adjudication services, says the common concerns about renting to students are valid to some extent, with cleaning topping the deposit deduction claims, but adds that its survey found no antisocial reasons for disputes, no issues with neighbours, and only a small percentage of redecoration claims.

Mid-tenancy inspections

“Positively, our poll observed that over three-quarters of landlords and agents perform mid-tenancy inspections,” she says. “TDS encourages property professionals to conduct regular inspections and include them within your tenancy agreement. Similarly, over half of agents and landlords polled confirmed that they attended the check-in/check-out with the tenants present.”

TDS advises that detailed inventories and check-in/check-out reports are vital to managing the property, navigating a successful end of tenancy and avoiding the chance of deposit disputes.

View Full Article: Students are no ‘Young Ones’ say the landlords happy to deduct for clean-up

Landlord’s heartfelt defence fails to avert £21,000 RRO

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Seven tenants have won a huge Rent Repayment Order after their landlord failed to licence a four-bedroom HMO, claiming he had received poor advice from his managing agent.

Jacob Cik, father of eight children – two of them disabled – needed more living space so signed a tenancy on the house at 23 Sach Road in Hackney with Goldpearl Estates Ltd. However, family circumstances meant he was unable to move in so had to sublet the property, a First Tier Property Tribunal heard.

Three signatures

He claimed managing agents City Homes told him that a group of solicitors renting a property was effectively one household and not an HMO. Cik did not realise there were three signatures on the agreement and also claimed deposit protection, gas safety fire assessment and electrical tests were the agent’s responsibility.

The tenants claimed there were only two smoke alarms in the property which had no fire doors, fire safety devices or emergency lighting. There were also no safety documents or managing agent’s details. They told the tribunal that in July 2020 a separate basement flat was created without any extra fire safety measures being put in place or fire risk assessments. They added that the landlord’s agents advertised the property as four-bedrooms but asked that only three tenants were named on the tenancy. The HMO was unlicensed from April 2020 to April 2021.

Full responsibility

The court ruled that it appeared Cik had “unwittingly lumbered himself” with responsibility for obtaining an HMO licence and failed to do this. “In effect he handed over full responsibility to his agents for management of the premises. In doing so he must accept responsibility for the actions of those agents.”

It made a 20% deduction to the RRO and ordered Cik to pay the tenants £21,600, adding: “The situation is such that one must hope that the other respondents will bear part of the load once an award is made.”

View Full Article: Landlord’s heartfelt defence fails to avert £21,000 RRO