Private landlords colonising housing market, preventing first time buying

Private landlords are out bidding first-time buyers and pushing house prices out of the reach of many young people, according to a new report.

Private landlords are out-bidding first-time buyers and pushing house prices out of the reach of many young people, according to a new report.

The Strategic Society Centre has called on the government to “tip the balance” back in favour of first time buyers and prevent landlords using their “equity advantage” to buy up empty homes, locking young people out of the property market.

Analysis by the Strategic Society Centre found that the average age of private landlords was 48 and the average age of renters 32. Mean financial wealth of landlords was £75,103 and the median £20,500, compared to just £9,506 mean and £398 median for renters.

Just under half of landlords have financial assets worth £30,000 or more, and a little over a quarter have assets worth over £70,000.

In the last 20 years the number of landlords has grown by 250 per cent, yet the number of households renting privately has risen from 2 million to 3.6million since 2000.

The report has a number of recommendations which it is calling on the government to enact, including:

  • A ‘new-build buy-to-let mortgage moratorium’, preventing the purchase of new-build homes with buy-to-let mortgages;

  • A ‘buy-to-let lending cap’ on the proportion of mortgage lending by banks that can be distributed buy-to-let mortgages;

  • A ‘three-year rule’, such that short-term tenancy agreements cannot be drawn up in relation to homes that are less than three years old, to ensure new-build homes become owner-occupied.

Recently Left Foot Forward looked at how long it now takes a first time buyer to save a deposit for a property, as well as at some potential responses to the spiraling cost of renting.

6 Responses to “Private landlords colonising housing market, preventing first time buying”

  1. blarg1987

    Another thing to add would be the abolishment of tax relief to BTL landlords making it less attractive to rent out property in the first place.

    Some would say fiddling the market but then again is it not ralready being fiddled as first time buys are at an unfair disadvantage?

  2. JC

    What tax relief do they get? I wasn’t aware of any and have never seen it mentioned.

  3. Rack

    I don’t know where those figures came from! Private landlords are not ‘colonising’ the housing market, but providing a service.

  4. JC

    Why not just build more houses? If we do this properly, the price of houses will decrease, allowing more people to buy their own house, those BTL landlords who have invested heavily will see the value of their assets disappear overnight and rents will decrease according to the drop in housing costs.

  5. RB

    They can claim interest payments as costs against income from tenants, thereby reducing their taxable income.

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