Major rental potential
GENERATION Rent has been with us for a decade and with a national housing shortage plus rising prices, there’s a good chance young people will wait even longer to buy their own home.The description was first used in 2011 following a Halifax Building Society survey that revealed two thirds of the UK’s 20 to 45-year-olds felt they had no chance of buying because homes were too expensive. Nearly 50 per cent of the 8,000 people questioned also believed Britain would increasingly consider renting as the norm.
And it looks like they were right: not only are build-to-rent apartments springing up in all major cities but there’s also a growing trend of renting furniture to tenants.
John Lewis launched a furniture rental service last year and found two thirds of its customers were renting accommodation. Now it is expanding to include more affordable items from its new ANYDAY range (johnlewispartnership.co.uk).
Similarly, Sofology has launched Loop to rent out its sofas, armchairs and footstools but with a sustainable twist: returned furniture is stripped back to its metal frame then rebuilt to rent out again, with every element recycled or reused (sofology.co.uk).
A recent Sofology survey confirmed that more than 60 per cent of tenants planned to rent for more than three years and one in five were content to rent for the rest of their lives.
Meanwhile, Zoopla’s latest figures show UK house prices are up 5.4 per cent compared to last year and demand for homes is up 23 per cent. “Demand levels in the rental market remain high in most parts of the country,” says Gráinne Gilmore, head of research at Zoopla, although she says some tenants are buyers who have sold up so they can move fast when they find their dream home.
For those not already on the property ladder, though, renting may not be a temporary solution says Pete Ladhams, managing director of Assael Architecture.
“While the increase in prices is great for existing homeowners, it pushes the chance of ownership out of reach for many, especially for first-time buyers,” he says. “The lasting legacy will be more people renting and for longer.”
The solution is to build more homes Ladhams says, but adds: “Designers and developers have the opportunity to diversify the market and build better-quality homes designed specifically for rent.”
Assael Architecture was involved in the design of Union Wharf in Greenwich, south east London, a pioneering build-to-rent development where 72 per cent of the site is public space: a pocket park, waterside walk and play area.
The block also has a large lobby, concierge and ground-floor café plus roof-level communal dining areas, lounges and exercise space. There are even community pizza ovens.
ONE-BEDROOM apartments are from £1,595 per calendar month, two bedrooms from £1,950 and three bedrooms from £2,475 (0800 2100 200; essentialliving.co.uk).
The promise of maintenance-free living, with modern appliances and no commitments is an increasingly winning formula, even at eye-wateringly expensive properties.
You can live the high life, quite literally, at 58-storey Newfoundland, where apartments have floor-to-ceiling views of the River Thames at Canary Wharf, as well as amenities that include a residents’ lounge and self-service bar, screening room and children’s play area.
All the apartments have balconies and there’s also a rooftop terrace with communal barbecues, games including shuffleboard in the lounge and guest suites for friends to rent.
Studio flats start from £1,928pcm, with one bedroom from £2,383, up to three bedrooms from £6,027 (020 7418 2600; thisisvertus.com).
Even baby boomers and the over-50s of Generation X are beginning to look at renting retirement flats rather than buying them. But with 3.5million single young adults living with their parents – up a third over the past 10 years – some millennials are managing to save for deposits, making them not so much Generation Rent as Generation Y Rent.