Private landlords need help to solve the seaside housing crisis

IN an era when local authority housing is no longer available at the level it once was and local authorities simply cannot build more to meet demand, the private rental sector is the option most people turn to if they cannot afford a home of their own.

So it makes sense to help private landlords continue to offer their properties for long term lets – especially in a region like the Westcountry where other options, like the holiday market, can look very attractive from a financial point of view.

That’s why St Ives MP Derek Thomas was right to call for measures to be taken to give landlords a boost when he raised the issue in a Westminster Hall debate this week.

It is easy to see private landlords as the bad guys in the housing sector. Over the years it has not been hard to find stories of shoddy homes, extortionate rents and harsh attitudes towards tenants in financial difficulty.

It may be more than 60 years since the notorious slum landlord Peter Rachman was operating his exploitative regime over his tenants in the Notting Hill area of London but Rachmanism still exists in the dictionary as a description of an unscrupulous landlord in the private rented sector.

Yet modern day property owners who are prepared to offer homes to tenants on long lets are now harder than ever to find in Devon and Cornwall. And one reason is that changes in the law, on tax breaks and energy efficiency requirements, make it far more lucrative and less trouble to turn a private rental property into a holiday let, through Airbnb or one of the other operators, and make a small fortune.

Conservative Mr Thomas pointed out in the Parliamentary debate that Cornwall has the highest net internal migration of any local authority, and that, as a result, the pressure on the housing stock is growing.

This, he said, is not helped by homes being left empty by some social housing operators or by family homes being sold off to second home owners or holiday lets. “The situation is urgent right now,” the St Ives MP said. “I have so many constituents who are in a desperate situation and it needs rapid and effective intervention that provides a secure home for life.”

Market forces will always be a challenge in popular holiday homes where property owners are tempted by the money to be made in the tourist rental market. But the rules can be tweaked to tip things slightly more in the favour of the private renter – and they should be.

Tax relief on buy-to-let mortgages would help. Relaxing the rules – or at least not imposing any tighter ones – on the energy ratings of private homes for rent would be a very useful first step.

There is nothing wrong with property owners making a decent living out of letting the homes they own to long-term tenants. In most cases it is a win-win: a tenant gets a home, the house owner gets an income.

There may once have been a case for tightening up the rules to prevent landlords exploiting their tenants, but with so many having exited the sector, there needs to be a rebalance.

There will always be a need for homes to rent. We need to look after those who can provide them.