Does Build-to-Rent hold the promise of more long-term investment?

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Build-to-Rent:

Will build-to-rent (BTR), institutional investment in the private rented sector (PRS), solve the “housing crisis� and remove the stigma of some of the worst excesses of private landlording?

Writing in leading property journal Property Week, Ami Kotecha, co-founder of Amro Real Estate Partners, and managing director of AmroLiving, thinks it will.

“At AmroLiving, we see BTR as an excellent opportunity for long-term institutional investment. As economic and societal factors shift what people want from property, we believe there is no time like the present to invest in our sector.�

With a recent House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee report stating that the UK government needs to boost the homebuilding target by 50 per cent, to create 300,000 new homes each and every year to keep up with demand, it seems the government is placing a lot of faith in BTR.

With almost half of 25 to 34-year-olds now living in the private rented sector, more families and more older people in single living accommodation, Ms Ami Kotecha says that renting should no longer be the “murky world of damp-ridden HMOs�

With house price rises still outpacing wage increases, high property prices will continue to prevent, particularly the young people, form buying. Meanwhile, high rents and high student debt compound the issue, which results in estimates like that proposed by Knight Frank: that by 2021, nearly one in four households in England will be renting.

Knight Frank’s research also points to the fact that the rise in renting is not just down to affordability: they found that 21 per cent of people rent to be in a better area; 8 per cent like the freedom from the responsibility of owning a home; 6 per cent need mobility and flexibility for work; 6 per cent are downsizing; and there are always those who rent between selling and buying.

Ms Ami Kotecha argues that living in a build-to-rent (BTR) property, with a strong amenity offer and a focus on service, is a natural next step for students who have been used to living in university student accommodation.

“The millennial generation, after all, is less focused on the long term. Traditional mortgage lenders have not yet adequately recognised the rise in freelancing and the gig economy and the ability to move anywhere around the world at short notice is worth more to many young professionals than the prospect of home ownership,� says Kotecha.

While institutional provision of rental property still represents only a small segment of the PRS, nevertheless it is growing, along with the size of the market. For this to continue it will need a big shift in the mind-set of traditional developers and builders, from one of short-term capital value added, to one of long-term management and stable rental income generation.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Does Build-to-Rent hold the promise of more long-term investment? | LandlordZONE.

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BTL property pick

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We are delighted to offer readers this fantastic opportunity to purchase a contemporary, 3 bed, new build, semi-detached house, with lots of extras in St Helens, near Liverpool.

We have already sold 4 plots at this popular development

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RLA call on banks to end Benefits discrimination

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The RLA is calling on the majority of Buy to Let lenders to stop discriminating against lending to Landlords that let to benefits tenants in their criteria. They are citing and example where a landlord had their Buy to Let mortgage called in

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Freehold maisonette above a shop – mortgage nightmare?

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I’m hoping that the well informed members of the forum will be able to help me with my problem below.

I unfortunately bought a freehold maisonette that resides over a flower shop below just over 2 years ago.

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Tenants’ union for tenants in Lincoln

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Tenants’ Union:

Is this a sign of what’s to come? As renting becomes more popular and populous, will tenant’s unions spring up and flex their muscle power, much as the labour unions did in the 1970s?

Renters’ unions are not a new concept. Tenants organised a rent strike in London’s East End to help win the Dockers Strike of 1891. During the First World War, protests ended in a ferocious Glasgow rent strike of 1915 which resulted in the war time coalition government of the time, for the first time in the UK, introducing rent controls for the private sector.

There has already been a commitment that a new Labour government will fund renter’s unions and they are already backing Generation Rent’s campaign to end Section 21, to scrap the assured shorthold tenancy (AST) and end landlords’ ability to evict tenants without giving a reason.

As reported in the Lincoln press, TheLinc.co.uk, Bradley Allsop, a PhD student in Political Science at the University of Lincoln, has set up a tenant’s union which he says is to address the “imbalance of power� between students and landlords in Lincoln.

Allsop had said:

“I’ve had bad landlords before but what I’ve seen this year has just been on another level.

“I was just plugging away on my own trying to challenge these people, and it got me thinking that if we could have a collective response it would be so much stronger than individuals trying to work on their own – that’s the philosophy of unions.

“There’s a power imbalance with landlords and letting agents, particularly with students, because landlords assume that students aren’t going to know their rights, aren’t going to know what they’re entitled to and will be too scared to challenge them so I suppose to some degree the renters union is trying to address that imbalance in power.�

The move to create a tenants’ union in Lincoln comes at a time when local authorities are being given new powers to tackle rogue landlords and the poor housing they provide, and in this authority one landlord has been handed a record fine of £400,000.

The new HMO regulations, which came into force on the 1^st of October, will include new rules on space requirements. They also include the requirement that all landlords with multiple occupancy properties, regardless of size or the number of storeys, housing five or more unrelated occupants, must have a mandatory HMO licence to operate.

Grace Corn, VP Welfare and Community at the University of Lincoln Students’ Union (SU), told TheLinc.co.uk:

“Housing is an issue which I feel is very important to students and the SU prides itself on representing student tenants’ rights.

“Whilst the renters union isn’t officially affiliated with the SU, it is worth noting that support is available for students from our on-campus SU’s Advice Centre.

“Since opening in 2015, the Advice Centre has assisted on hundreds of cases involving students, landlords and agencies.�

The new tenants’ union will be part of a nationwide of unions known as “ACORN�, which is said to have groups across the UK from Belfast to Bristol.

ACORN claims to be “…a community-based union tackling injustice across the country, bringing people together to support each other to improve their lives and their communities. We have branches in Bristol, Brighton, Manchester, Sheffield and Newcastle, and other groups getting set up all over England and Wales.”

Mr Allsop said he is already getting good support for his union:

“I thought something like this would take a while to get off the ground but we’ve had quite a lot of people interested already and from talking to some of them it seems to be that they have been bitten by the private rented sector and are a bit fed up and want to do something about it.

“It might be just the existence of a group that’s got a good membership that will be enough to make some landlords think twice about pulling a fast one, which will be great in itself.�

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Tenants’ union for tenants in Lincoln | LandlordZONE.

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Patrick Collinson has got it wrong yet again!

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Last year I described how Patrick Collinson had misunderstood two reports with big numbers in them:

Patrick Collinson “Guardian of Housing Ignorance�

Patrick Collinson has done it again!

This week he has blindly quoted the press release for a report –

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Open Letter to Landlords and Shelter

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Landlords, Our sector is under attack like never before.

Politicians and pressure groups who want to tax and regulate the PRS out of existence are causing unbelievable hardship for tenants. The new UK tax on turnover goes against all the basic norms of accountancy rules.

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Generation Rent tries to hoodwink policymakers

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On Tuesday Generation Rent published a paper by its Director, Dan Wilson Craw. He proves – to his own satisfaction at least – that the Law of Supply and Demand does not apply to the UK’s private rented sector. The paper is called “Do measures that discourage buy-to-let investment increase rents?â€� Click here

He claims they don’t.

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Buy-to-Let continues to offer positive returns

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Buy-to-Let Investment:

Despite the added pressure on landlords, from tax changes to many additional regulations, buy-to-Let (BTL) investment still offers returns well above average savings rates.

This is supported by the still strong demand for renting in the UK, and the fact that should there be another downturn, accompanied by rinsing inflation (interest rates are on a rising trend), then property offers a safe haven for money when compared to stocks, shares and bonds.

A recent survey carried out by Agents, Your Move, shows that the average percentage return on BTL investments throughout England and Wales was stable between July and August:

• Each of the 10 regions surveyed delivered the same yield to investors in the September survey as they did in August.
• Those BTLs in northern regions earned higher percentage returns than those located in southern areas.
• The average investor in the North East saw an annual yield of 5% in the year to August while in the North West this figure was 4.8%.
• London landlords saw the smallest percentage returns, recording 3.2% during August.
• Across all of England and Wales, landlords enjoyed an average yield of 4.4% in August, the same as in both June and July.

Despite the much touted “sell off�, the majority of landlords appear to be committed to BLT for the long-term, many having been in the sector for 15 years or more and over half see BTL as their pension pot.

Although rent levels have risen steadily over the last 7 years (see charts below) average yields have declined by around 1% in that time, while there has been no appreciable increase in rent arrears levels.

Your Move’s Landlord Survey also reveals that:

Around 29% of the small-scale landlords in BTL were originally ‘accidental’ landlords, who were in-the-main female under the age of 45. Another 20% saw themselves as professional landlords, that is portfolio landlords doing this as a full-time career and were mainly over 45. The rest would be part-time landlords investing in BTL property alongside an alternative career, seeing their investment as both a pension and a source of regular income.

The part-time landlords surveyed were more likely to live close to their rentals than were the accidental or professional landlords, with around 41% living within a striking distance of one to five miles of the property.

Martyn Alderton, national lettings director at Your Move, has said:

“Our research suggests that the private rental sector is still seen to offer significant opportunities, providing many landlords with a source of income and funding into retirement.

“It’s also clear that pension pot landlords are keen to build a personal rapport with tenants who will look after their investment. As an industry, it’s increasingly important that we continue to support these ties, providing long-term benefits to tenants looking for a property to call their home and also for landlords looking for ways to fund their retirement.�

The Your Move BTL Rental Index Charts below show Rent Yields and Rent Arrears:

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Shelter’s website says Section 21 does not cause homelessness

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Last Friday Melanie Onn MP had an article published in The House, Parliament’s Magazine. Melanie Onn is Labour MP for Great Grimsby and shadow minister for housing. Towards the end she wrote “We’d also tighten up tenancy rules to help prevent private evictions

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