After years - indeed a decade - of anti-rental sector policy and rhetoric it’s difficult not to see recent days as a victory, of sorts.
The Renters Reform Bill may be in the long grass and costly new EPC and boiler targets definitely are - surely old Section 24 tax incentives for buy to let can’t be resuscitated, can they?
Trade bodies like ARLA Propertymark and the National Residential Landlords Association have waged a long and determined fight of resistance against many unfair measures in recent years. They deserve credit.
There’s been their opposition to net zero measures which were clearly unaffordable, while maintaining the importance of net zero as an overall objective.
There’s also been resistance from the NRLA and Propertymark to many aspects of the Renters Reform Bill which combined (and on top of all else) have made buy to let increasingly unviable - leading directly to today’s stock shortage and rent rises.
Tax incentives
But we need to be honest and see that while lobbying has been vital, the decisions and delays we’ve seen this month are down to one thing only - party political expediency.
Sunak hasn’t torn up someone else’s EPC targets for landlords or someone else’s gas boiler deadlines - they were ones he signed off in Cabinet.
If there really is a delay in the Second Reading of the Renters Reform Bill it’s probably not, at this relatively late stage, because of lobbying by landlords.
Instead, it’s likely to be down to a much-speculated set of polls conducted by the Tory party allegedly showing that renters remain highly likely to vote Labour - despite a decade of anti-landlord rhetoric, tax measures and red tape introduced by the Conservatives.
And bringing back those tax incentives for the rental sector?
Unexpected lurch
I would say it’s wishful thinking, and it would certainly be a hard sell to a population suffering some of the highest levels of taxation for many decades.
But never say never: if it is to happen, don’t expect it to be flagged up as a tax break for landlords, so look out for a well disguised measure introduced at the Autumn Statement on November 23.
Don’t get me wrong.
As a landlord and as an informed observer lucky enough to spend my life writing about property, the announcements of recent weeks are good news because they will help stop the haemorrhaging of rental stock.
And it remains vital trade bodies continue their rugged and well researched opposition to what is plainly wrong for the industry.
But as victories go, this is pyrrhic: in reality it’s just one unexpected lurch along the road to General Election 2024.
There will be many more to come…
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I've been a property manager for 30 years and have seen it all. That includes watching the PRS burgeon and now contract again. It's very clear that diminishing yields, increasing red tape and a Wild West approach to the industry have all helped to get us where we are. Recent misdirection from the government is causing further uncertainty. It's about time we had a tsar who knows his stuff to make policy. The PRS has grown and it's a very important part of a lot of peoples lives, yet it is treated as an inconvenient itch sometimes. The whole sector needs more care and attention, both for tenants and landlords. Supply and demand balance is at the heart of any successful sector and ours is way out of whack.
When it comes to legislation to do with the property market political expediency has been the priority of every government since the war so this minor stalling of the impossible race to Net Zero (whatever that really means) doesn’t in my opinion make the slightest difference to the decimation of the PRS. Along with the Marxist pressure groups hand in hand with Labour, the SNP & Greens we are being marginalised to the point of submission. The resultant massive hole in available housing will serve them right as we find safer, less problematic more lucrative homes for our hard earned savings,
The SNP/Greens have done more damage to the Scottish PRS than a demolition contractor. They have absolutely no idea what’s needed or what they’re doing. The Greens are self confessed landlord haters. Some of the social media posts from them, as our government representatives, are arrogant and ignorant! Time for change!
The SNP/Greens have done more damage to the Scottish PRS than a demolition contractor. They have absolutely no idea what’s needed or what they’re doing. The Greens are self confessed landlord haters. Some of the social media posts from them, as our government representatives, are arrogant and ignorant! Time for change!
I've said it for years, they more they mess with Landlords the worse it gets for tenants and I'm not wrong. If they were to encourage landlords, rents would drop, but they favour unrealistic home ownership at the expense of the rental market.
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