Rental Market Commentary May 2010
Good news for landlords: rents are recovering! Bad news for tenants: rental property stock is disappearing fast in many areas and over the next six to twelve monthfs rents will rise!
From an investor's perspective, buy to let has started to come back into fashion. Capital gains only increased to 28% for those in the higher income bracket (watch out though if you are selling and on basic rate tax as the sale might push you into paying the higher rate).
New offers of what to do with your savings as half a million savers come off some great 6% plus investment returns from a few years ago, are no where near as good as property is today. FindaProperty's index for Q2 2010 shows rental yields are now at 4.57%. Many canny investors though are getting a lot more than this by buying properties at good prices (despite news headlines properties are, in the main still 10% or more less than 2007 heights).
Latest news for landlords and tenants is good and bad. The bad news for both is that the new Coalition haven't implemented regulating letting agents, which considering the amount of money they look after is crazy. So do make sure you ALWAYS use an ARLA or NALS registered letting agent - if you don't, you may lose your money and if you are a tenant, your home.
The good news however is that the silly initiatives of three or more sharers requiring planning permission is under review and may not be implemented and the idea of a trip advisor style website for tenants to rate landlords has gone. Apparently they are doing it for free on Facebook already!
Regional Differences
To help you know what's happening in your area, please find below summary of the latest FindaProperty Index and Belvoir Lettings Statistics.
| Area | Average Rent | Annual Rental % Change |
| London | £1,730 | 6.4% |
| South East | £1,090 | 0.8% |
| South West | £817 | 3.5% |
| Wales | £614 | 1.1% |
| West Midlands | £639 | 2.1% |
| East Midlands | £614 | 2.8% |
| East England | £788 | 3.7% |
| Yorkshire/The Humber | £553 | -0.7% |
| North West | £621 | -2.5% |
| North East | £591 | -3.7% |
| Scotland | £710 | 4% |
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:-
Belvoir Region | Jan 10
to Mar 10 | Apr 10
to Jun 10 |
London | -5.51% | -1.92% |
South East | -0.77% | +0.80% |
South West | -0.46% | +0.14% |
West Midlands | -0.57% | +0.34% |
East Midlands | -1.75% | +0.30% |
East Anglia | +0.14% | -0.02% |
Yorkshire | +0.06% | +1.05% |
North West | +3.36% | -7.27% |
North East | +0.73% | +0.51% |
Scotland | +0.32% | +0.32% |
Wales | -1.25% | +0.12% |
Whole of UK | -0.98% | +1.80% |
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% |
