Small landlords selling off isn't a great news after all

[Goingindrain]

My landlord is a small landlord, just owns his house and the one where we live. He is a nice man and charges us below the market rate rent.
He is fed up of all the anti landlord rules and has decided to sell. It seems he had an offer from FTB and then a big corporation put in an offer 10k over and he's selling it off to them via the agents.
I am worried about the rent going up and it's not a great news for tenants.

Small landlord here with 2 rental properties.
Both have had the same tenants since we rented them out (when we got married and bought a joint house).

Fantastic tenants, and we are great landlords. Definitely charge below the market value, but that's because we like them and want them to stay as they look after the houses so well.

However, we are starting to feel the pressure to sell. We will continue to step rent up a little each year, but even so eventually we will be out of pocket. However when we sell we will have a huge CGT bill to pay :(

We would love to keep the properties for investment into our children's future. We've work hard to be able to do this, and now it is all likely to be taken away.

This all started when they made a change to the tax system where we can't put the interest on the mortgage against the costs anymore.

We're really sad about it and feel totally stuck :(

Are yes you're right. I know landlord organisations were lobbying for that, but I thought it had been refused. It seems the amendments got through in the end.

There will also be a mandatory new Ombudsman service for ALL landlords to be a part of. Though what the price of that is and what that involves no one knows as it hasn't been invented yet.

So another finger in the air thing of future costs.

@thecatneuterer Do you have link to the amendments? I’m curious to see what they are.

Thinking of my own student days in the 1990’s, we rented a v. dodgy house, six of us crammed in and then one girl started getting headaches…turned out the gas fire in her room was leaking!

But then I know someone IRL who owns a couple of student rentals and they’re really nice. She’s even including free WIFI!

It will no doubt be an overly bureaucratic quango which just adds more costs to landlords who will pass them on to tenants.

Are you suggesting that my friend just randomly lied to me about this for no apparent reason?

thanks for the patronising lesson, but I do know how credit scores work! Obviously the landlord can't access anyone's cc themselves, no more than anyone else can. What they can do is ask prospective applicants to access their own scores themselves and provide screenshots etc.

Whether they should do this or it is a relevant or fair way of choosing applicants is all debatable, what isn't is that it did actually happen!

As my friend had a very good score she agreed to provide it as she thought it would go in her favour. Perhaps there were other applicants who refused to provide theirs, I don't know - the point is that the landlord for a fairly standard property in a not particularly nice area, had their choice of applicants despite the insane amount they were charging for rent.

Actually landlords can access people's credit scores. It's something I always do as part of referencing. All you need is for the tenant to give you their name, DOB and last couple of addresses, and to put in writing that they give consent for you to do it. It costs around £20.

6 million households in the UK would not qualify for a mortgage apparently.

To do so much damage to the PRS without ensuring that there is enough social rented accommodation to make up for any shortfall is downright dumb. It will be interesting to see what happens, but I'm bloody glad I'm not a LL any more, and I'm certainly very glad that I'm not a tenant.

That’s not a bad thing if that happens. Would free up housing for families/couples, etc. there needs to be more/sufficient halls for students so they’re not clogging up the local housing market.

Is that not at least in part, down to the tenants? The rental property (only 15 years old) that I've become responsible for, was in a shocking state, due to the tenants blocking all ventilation (so black mould all over the place) and their general lack of any care or respect for the property. They'd had a new bathroom, new carpets and various other work done promptly, not to mention no rent rise for 14 years. I've had to spend £2000 just to get it clean, mould-free, functional and the scrapyard that they'd turned the garden into, cleared. But the buyer will still have to completely redecorate, replace rusted radiators and put a new kitchen in.

None of that is down to me or a landlord that didn't do all that was asked of them

Another former (good) landlord here who was charging below market rent. Then, after 20 years with no problems, we had a bad tenant - very antisocial behaviour including drug taking and not paying rent. It was extremely stressful but thankfully didn't take long to get the tenant out as we could serve a no-fault eviction and sell up.

Upcoming extra restrictions on landlords made that decision clear. I wouldn't want it to have been any more difficult to evict a tenant like that

@TeenagersAngst - I get that - but my meaning was they haven't even thought it up yet, though landlords will be expected to implement it as soon as they have. Here and now, it could be ANYTHING and could cost anything but landlords will be expected to suck it up and join or face penalty whether they like it or even agree with the wording or not.

I understand your point, but purpose built commercial student housing is very much more expensive - probably somewhere in the region of 40% more on average.

Mind you - I think there are far too many people going to university these days - but that's another argument entirely.

@thecatneuterer Yes, we live near a university ( in the US) and they’ve built some very nice student housing, but it’s really expensive. Not everyone in the area was thrilled when it was built either as some terraces had to be bulldozed to make space.

My DD is at another uni and she’s sharing a less fancy apartment - as she wisely says, she doesn’t want to waste money on somewhere she’ll only be living in for a couple of years. Plus they’re hardly ever in!

In theory it’s a good idea for universities to provide long-term housing, but getting it built and paid for is more complicated.

Is the huge CGT bill because you made a huge profit? Poor you, my heart bleeds.

Companies like Experian can do a check for landlords. I use it (and pay for it). It tells you about affordability, validates employment, any defaults etc.
If the tenant doesn’t consent to that they don’t become my tenant.
The only bad tenants I had we when I used an agent. Sunce I started self screening they have been great.

Not necessarily, as inflation is no longer taken into account. The profit may be no more than inflation.

Landlords do have a bad reputation and maybe an industry body would be a good idea.
@saraclara realise it's too late now, but an annual inspection would have helped both parties in your situation. Stressful though.
I doubt corporate landlords would allow tenants to trash the place like that.

It's usually a condition in the lease that the property is not rented other than as a tenancy. It would be worthwhile checking your lease to see if the leaseholders are breaching the terms.

It should be made easier to get rid of tenants who fail to look after a property but one of the issues is that people with a limited disposable income cannot always afford to heat the property appropriately which can and often does lead to mould and other delapidation. Hence careful landlords let only to professionals not in receipt of benefits.

It's very sad that the risk to landlords is elevated and so they cannot afford to take a risk when choosing a tenant.

There is an industry body. The National Residential Landlords' Association.

Sold ours last december, was accidental, as family owners went into care homes, lovely long term tenants, we charged about 30% below market rent and they have gone home to romania so decided to sell, was already doing lots of paperwork for licences etc etc , we chose a good time to sell and paid the cgt, we wouldnt get the prices we got now. funds paid off care home fees outstanding and left a small sum for the family. the money can earn 5% now and no stress as did once have drug dealing mafia tenants who destroyed a house and caused 18k of damage which insurance wouldnt cover.

That’s interesting, happened to my son in York - was given notice as landlord wanted to change his flat to an Air B’n’B. She was gradually working through the whole building (converted Victorian house).

@TonTonMacoute I was responding to the poster who seemed to be implying that rented properties were the reason that people can't buy their own property because they're all owned by landlords.
Of course, this isn't the reason at all...

But if there was more commercial purpose built student accommodation the price might come down as there would be more competition?

dd pays £900 a month in a purpose built flat, includes all bills and laundry and a gym. Walking distance to uni in the city centre. If she lived in one of the main student areas she’d be looking at £700 a month, not including bills and no gym or laundry. 20 min bus ride each day with the cost of an annual bus pass.