Landlords have never had it so good (From The Argus)
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Landlords have never had it so good
8:30am Friday 3rd February 2012 in Your Argus
WITH rents at an all-time high, interest rates at a historic low, buy-to-let experiencing a new boom and tenant demand higher than ever, local landlords and the National Landlord Association have picked an interesting time to complain about their lot (Letters, January 28).
They’ve never had it so good! The proposed Houses of Multiple Occupancy (HMO) licence expansion to include smaller properties would cost a landlord £450 over five years. If £90 a year is going to break the bank, it is probably time to get out of the landlord lark. As for “onerous” regulation, it’s such a shame that ensuring a three-bedroom house has adequate fire safety precautions is something landlords seek to shy away from.
As a tenant for many years, I have dealt with landlords and lettings agents. Some are good, some are bad. To focus on rogue landlords is right, but not the only problem. In my experience, amateurish landlords who don’t know the basic laws are numerous. Lettings agents, too, seem to be unregulated and expensive.
To put the landlord HMO charge into perspective, I was charged a letting agent admin fee for two tenants signing a 12-month AST last year of £385. Eye-watering charges in the hundreds of pounds to renew tenancies, cover referencing and the like are commonplace from lettings agents.
The council must go further. Clamp down on rogue landlords, using the powers they already have, and go for compulsory registration of all landlords at a price that also raises money for council coffers. Some people are getting fat from the housing shortage in this city and ever-rising rents. It’s time to cream off some of those profits for the public purse.
Dan Wilson, Brunswick Mews, Hove
Comments(6)
redwing
says...
11:14am Fri 3 Feb 12
That experience is in line with the vast majority of private rental tenants.
To try to suggest that landlords/letting agents are providing some sort of public service with the rents at double/triple those of the social housing sector and no security of tenure is ridiculous.
As the writer of the letter suggests, some people are getting very rich indeed doing very little and exploiting other people's desperate housing need. It's a sick society we live in.
P.S. reducing your rents might get you more prompt payment from your tenants.
bug eye
says...
3:36pm Fri 3 Feb 12
RottingdeanRant
says...
3:53pm Fri 3 Feb 12
saveHOVE
says...
5:30pm Fri 3 Feb 12
The ideal landlord is a professional portfolio landlord who retains ownership over many decades and who therefore does not NEED to jack up the rents to silly levels (but does because he/she/they can in the current unregulated climate).
The government needs to look at Germany and other places where renting is more the norm and where pension funds are the landlords looking for a stable return and not a quick mega-killing from the constant churn of buying and selling to make instant profits.
The more frequently a property changes hands, the higher the rents have to be to justify that purchase or to satisfy the company providing the mortgage.
Not until property prices implode and stabilise at a proper level will there be any hope for sanity in the rental market. It is cruel and perpetuated by successive Governments. This HAS TO CHANGE. And it is not about just building more and more and more stuff.
Sorting out the north of England so its residents don't have to move south to 'get a life' would help. If its so bad up north, why do people live even further north in Denmark and Sweden?
No brainer for ambitious politicians who just can't be arsed to sort it.
nicole/bob
says...
9:44pm Fri 3 Feb 12
We are fortunate to own two fairly large houses in central Hove which we spend a lot of time and money in maintaining to a good standard.
However, we have a rogue absentee landlord who owns a property on the corner of our road who has allowed the place to become effectively a slum hostel with rubbish/abandoned furniture/washing lines etc etc stacked up outside...have complained to the Council and they have given him six months (!) to sort matters out...how useless is that and what is the point of complaining in the first place?
Bob, Hove
ShorehamBeachcomber says...
9:00am Fri 3 Feb 12