Landlords’ demise

SIR – Melissa Lawford highlights the crisis engulfing the private rental sector (“Landlords’ profits to fall to £7 a year as mortgage rates cripple investors”, report, November 13).

It represents around 18.5 per cent (4.4 million) of households, equating to more than 10.5 million people. Privately rented homes meet a demand that’s not provided for by public-sector housing, particularly in rural areas. As an economist, chartered surveyor and investor in the market for over 42 years, I’ve never seen it in such crisis. Sadly the only way for landlords to minimise losses or break even and keep tenants in their homes is to increase rents dramatically.

In addition, many landlords will have to invest significantly to upgrade their properties to comply with new regulations before 2025, at costs that have increased hugely due to inflation.

Given interest-rate uncertainty, we now have to renew or grant leases for six-month terms only, to allow for six-monthly rental uplifts. This is because the Government, the Treasury and the Bank of England, which are meant to act in concert, continue to dish out the wrong medicine to deal with cost-push inflation.

Hamptons, the property agents, reported that more than 16 per cent of private rental stock was sold off by landlords last year. This means that within five years there could be little or no private rental property available, with millions of people having to find new homes in an increasingly stressed and limited marketplace.

The demise of the sector will accelerate dramatically if the powersthat-be disregard what’s happening in the real world.

David Waller

Cound, Shropshire