Rental Market Commentary January 2010
Rental incomes continue to take fall backwards in January - to levels not seen for the whole of 2009. It's likely that this is a 'temporary dip' with Xmas, the poor weather and landlords' who rented out a year ago having to rent for less than they did before.
However, if you have a good quality property and the area is undersupplied, property continues to rent well and indeed some tenants are starting to compete on price again.
Regional Differences
As always with property, 'UK averages' rarely help you understand what's actually happening in your area. And the FindaProperty Index shows this to be true with:-
Top Performing Areas
Wales Rental Income -0.5% yoy, average of £645 per month giving a 4.42% average yield
South West Rental Income -1.6% yoy, -0.6% month on month and an average of £797 per month giving a 4.0% average yield
Poor Performing Areas
Yorkshire Rental Income -12% yoy, average of £530 per month giving a 4.7% average yield.
East Midlands Rental Income -7.2% yoy, average of £595 per month giving a 5.4% average yield
Belvoir Lettings Regional Lettings Index
Belvoir is one of the top franchised letting agents in the UK and takes pride in ensuring they let quality properties legally and at fair prices. They have over 140 offices across the UK and kindly let us have access to their national and regional lettings index:-
The following figures show the South East has been quick to recover from rental falls and that London's rental market has turned a corner. Most areas bar the North East and East Anglia (suffering from outmigration) are still taking a while to recover.
Belvoir Region | Jul 08
to Sep 08 | Oct 08
to Dec 09 | Jan 09
to Mar 09 | Apr 09
to Jun 09 | July 09
to Sep 09 | Oct 09
to Dec 09 |
London | -2% | -2.4% | -1.75% | -5.51% | +7.48% | +11.19% |
South East | 6.9% | -2.8% | -4% | +1% | +3.25% | -2.63% |
South West | -1.4% | -1.0% | -3.6% | -1% | +0.57% | -0.58% |
West Midlands | 0.6% | -0.8% | +4% | -2.55% | -2.36% | +0.15% |
East Midlands | 1.6% | -2.6% | -2% | -3.32% | -0.01% | +0.15% |
East Anglia | -1.9% | -1.0% | +2% | -3.98% | -2.29% | 0% |
Yorkshire | 2.9% | 1.9% | +2.9% | -3.57% | -1.20% | -1.31% |
North West | 1% | -0.5% | -2.7% | -3.05% | +0.45% | +0.92% |
North East | 0% | 0% | -0.75% | -1% | -3.89% | +3.71% |
Scotland | 17% | -3.8% | -0.4% | -1.36% | -1.39% | +15.51% |
Whole of UK | 0% | -1.4% | -1.95% | -1.5% | 0% | +0.68% |
