Like every month, Rentila offers you an overview of the main real estate news of interest to landlords and tenants. This month, we focus on: What does the Current Rental Market Look Like?; UK house prices and their swift fall; Why are UK mortgage approvals at an all-time low?; One in ten renters are keeping a pet hidden from their landlord; Quarter of renters do not ask for repairs due to fear of eviction; How to sell your house in a slow market; Landlords see a massive increase in fraudulent tenancy applications… Happy reading and… renting!
What does the Current Rental Market Look Like?
The BoE hopes to reign inflation back to beneath its target of 2%, and interest rates offer a powerful means of doing it: with borrowing becoming more expensive, demand for new homes has collapsed.
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York housing market is ‘picking up’ – bucking the national trend
House sales across York are beginning to buck the UK trends again after a “slow end” to last year, as stretched mortgage affordability weighs on the housing market.
The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) has found that the housing market is having to adjust to a tighter lending climate.
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UK house prices up 0.8% in March
UK property asking prices rose by 0.8% in March from the prior month and showed signs of stabilising after last year’s ‘mini-budget’ that created severe market volatility…
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England’s out of kilter property market – rental stock accounts for just 5% of available homes in some areas of England
There’s no denying that we’re a nation of homeowners and the latest figures on tenure show that there are almost 15.6m owner occupiers across England, accounting for 64% of the total market. However, while renters make up the remaining 36%, the market is way out of kilter when it comes to the proportion of rental homes available…
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UK house prices and their swift fall
House prices in the UK have fallen at their fastest yearly pace since 2009. The price of an average property fell 3.1 per cent from a year ago, according to the Nationwide Building Society. The average house price in March was £257,122.
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UK housing market is ‘broken’, needs greater supply and higher standards
“The current housing model – from supply to standards and the mortgage market – is broken,” says the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.
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London property market stagnant amid warnings of UK-wide house price falls
Greater London and the North East are the only UK regions to have avoided a slowdown in annual house price growth in March, according to new figures from Halifax.
The average cost of a home in the capital is now £537,250…
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These are the UK areas where house prices have risen the most in the last decade
New research shows the UK areas with the highest increase in property prices in the past decade with Hastings in East Sussex taking the top spot, with a house price increase of 113.6% over the last ten years.
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UK housing market weakness continues, improvement on the horizon
Britain’s housing market continued to feel the pinch of higher borrowing costs in March, but property surveyors expect some improvement over the year ahead as they think interest rates are now near their peak…
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What’s Happening With UK Mortgage Rates?
The Bank of England raised interest rates in March from 4% to 4.25%. The 0.25 percentage point increase marks the 11th rise since December 2021 when Bank rate stood at just 0.1%. It puts Bank rate at its highest level since 2008…
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Why are UK mortgage approvals at an all-time low?
The UK housing market has been significantly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the consequences has been a fall in the number of mortgage approvals, which has reached an all-time low. According to data from the Bank of England, mortgage approvals fell to 47,093 in December 2022…
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House sales dip but average fixed mortgage rates hit a six-month low
House sales fell by nearly a fifth (18%) in February 2023 compared with the same month a year earlier, in signs that the housing market is slowing…
Across the UK, an estimated 90,340 homes were sold in February this year.
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Fixed mortgage rates prolong bad news on inflation
In the old days it was simple. When interest rates went up you could look forward to paying a lot more for your mortgage the very next month.
It was a painful but effective anti-inflationary tool that instantly sucked huge levels of demand out of the economy.
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First-time buyers’ mortgage bills up by £500 a month
Monthly payments, based on the two-year fixed rate and average advance for those looking to get a mortgage for the first time, rose from £837 in January 2022 to £1,303 in December…
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IMF report says interest rates set to return to pre-pandemic levels when inflation tamed
The IMF, on Monday, said that “recent increases in real interest rates are likely to be temporary. When inflation is brought back under control, advanced economies’ central banks are likely to ease monetary policy and bring real interest rates back towards pre-pandemic levels”.
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Mortgage rates continue to creep down
A 0.1% rate reduction for 95% loan to value (LTV) two-year fixed deals is the biggest downwards movement in mortgage rates, according to Rightmove’s tracker.
Borrowers with a 5% deposit can now secure an average rate of 5.52%…
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Skyrocketing rents, job-style interviews and ‘dangerous’ housing: inside the capital’s renting hell
Last month, Mayor of London Sadiq Khan repeated demands for the Government to freeze private rents and ban evictions, arguing that renters are facing a “triple whammy, with rising rents, bills and the cost of household essentials”.
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One in ten renters are keeping a pet hidden from their landlord
A study of 1,000 adults, who have ever rented and owned a pet at the same time, found 10 per cent are living with a furry friend despite it being banned as part of their rental agreement.
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Landlords raise rent on more than half of properties in England
Private-sector landlords in England increased rents on more than half of homes in the year to February, up from just over a third a year earlier, further tightening the squeeze on households amid a cost of living surge…
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New ‘How to rent guide’ is published
This is the first update since July 2021 and the guide must be issued by landlords and letting agents – and to those tenants who are renewing a tenancy.
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Quarter of renters do not ask for repairs due to fear of eviction
A research suggested that the rate of renters who have complained to the council, landlord or letting agent about repairs, conditions or harassment in the last three years and been evicted or threatened with eviction during that time is nearly three times that of those who had not complained.
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Increase in rental properties leaves landlords ‘open to rent negotiations’
Chestertons’ latest market review reveals that, in London, there were 37% more rental properties on the market in February 2023 vs February last year.
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Renting in Manchester now less affordable than in parts of London
The average property in Manchester costs £875 a month to rent, according to the latest data from the Valuation Office Agency. The average income, meanwhile, works out at £2,008 a month, before tax. It means that on average, people spend 44% of their income on rent.
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Six ways to bring down costs on rising mortgage rates
Mortgage costs are likely to rise as the Bank of England continues to raise interest rates to tackle inflation.
There are 356,000 homeowners at risk of missing their mortgage payments…
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UK Property Investment Tips – 4 Things You Should Know
The world of property investment is widely known to be a lucrative opportunity for many budding investors.
For years, it has been the go-to choice for those seeking substantial amounts of passive income and considerable capital appreciation.
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Where to invest in the UK property market in 2023
The UK property market has seen unprecedented changes since the start of the pandemic. From house prices continually rising to a shift in buyers’ preferences, COVID-19 has changed the way we live, rent, and buy property for the long term.
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How to sell your house in a slow market
This is traditionally the best time of the year to be selling a home – between March and June – but while the property market is nowhere near as bad as many people had feared at the start of the year, it’s not a golden age either.
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Mortgage experts believe now is a good time for homeowners and home buyers to lock into a fixed-rate loan
Although interest rates are at their highest level for almost two decades, mortgage experts believe now is a good time for homeowners and home buyers to lock into a fixed-rate loan.
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How to build a buy-to-let empire, by the landlords who did it
A year of interest rates hikes, the threat of more tenant-friendly contracts, and new Capital Gains Tax regulations now biting; the past 12 months have been an annus horribilis for British landlords.
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Landlords fear the scrapping of s21 – and are selling up
The potential scrapping of section 21 worries a third of landlords and is a ‘driving force’ behind growing numbers selling up and leaving the private rented sector (PRS), a survey reveals.
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Student landlords – and students – will suffer under periodic tenancies
The looming ban on fixed-term tenancies as part of the Renters Reform Bill will cause chaos for both students and landlords in the university rental sector, experts say.
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Is it time to think about regulating residential property rents?
Sometimes in life the moons align. Such rare events often present opportunity.
They are aligned around the possibility of regulation of the rental payments made by tenants to their institutional fund management landlords.
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One in 12 grandparents use property wealth to support grandchildren
A survey of 2,000 grandparents in the UK, found that younger grandparents (aged 50-64) are twice as likely to use property wealth to gift to grandchildren (10%) vs 65-74 year olds (5%). This indicates the next generation of grandparents are becoming more likely to consider the value of their homes as part of their financial planning.
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BTL landlords urged to back campaign against damaging rental housing policies
Buy-to-let landlords are being asked to back a campaign to challenge policies that are having an adverse impact on the private rented sector north of the border.
It follows a decision by the Scottish government to develop a rent freeze and ban on repossessions in the private rented sector…
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Flats and maisonettes sell for the highest prices in £1 million-plus property market
In 2022, the average price paid for high-end flats and maisonettes was £1,908,782 compared with £1,805,004 for terraced houses; £1,663,880 for semi-detached houses and £1,616,859 for detached houses, Investec Wealth & Investment’s analysis of the most recent Land Registry data for England and Wales found.
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Airbnb planning permission: The new plans explained… and why hosts are furious
The housing secretary has laid out a policy which, if passed into law and adopted by councils, would require property owners to obtain planning permission to convert existing homes into short-term holiday accommodation.
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Landlords see a massive increase in fraudulent tenancy applications
There’s never been a tougher time for the private rented sector (PRS) with demand soaring and stock dwindling tenants are struggling with finding a place to live.
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