How do landlords selling up impact the rental market?

[Rispa42]

Genuinely curious because it’s been said that one of the reasons the rental market is heating up is because BTL landlords are selling up, and therefore leading to an imbalance between supply and demand. However, if they sell, they’d either sell to another landlord (therefore not impacting supply) or to a FTB who was previously renting (therefore reducing ‘demand’). What am I missing?

Yeah it's horrendous. This is why my house (I'm an accidental landlord) is rented out at the bare minimum to cover costs - about a third of market rate. I may be a landlord but I'm also not a selfish dick and in return I have a lovely family of tenants who would absolutely not otherwise be able to afford rents where my house is (Easton). No way am I going to evict them to sell or make a bit of profit.

Would be so simple to block Sales to non-UK residents.

Our BTL are both a
four bedroom detached houses worth over 400k. I doubt very much it would be first time buyers purchasing them. We look after the properties really well and have good tenants. We won't be selling, because we're in it for the long term, but our mortgage has just gone up by £600 a month which is a personal hit to our family income.

@ThreeFeetTall yes yes we would
@C4tastrophe shd all business bd run at a loss 🤯🤯🤯🤯

It’s a failed business if you are in competition with landlords who own outright and don’t have your overheads.

BTL was only ever viable before S24 and with near Zero Rates.
With S24, and normal interest rates, with Banks now pricing BTL more like commercial loads, BTL is toast.
It was only going to end this way. Sell the BTL’s, pay your CGT and sit back and enjoy the equity.

@C4tastrophe ive been in BTL for 28 years and it has been very good now not so much of course a business is more profitable if you have no overheads as in no mortgage

Well you must own a number outright yourself, just sell the mortgaged ones.

@C4tastrophe how did you work that out ? Anyway it is what it is it’s been a good business now not so much

Most mortgages are 25 years.

We've just sold one of our rentals mainly because we've just taken early retirement. We sold it to the tenants who were ftb.
It was always our plan to sell one at that stage. There are too many 'accidental' landlords or btl investors that don't have a plan and sell on a whim as soon as things get tough.
We're keeping the rest for now as they are all EPC rated C even the victorian terrace. It was easy - loft insulation, energy saving light bulbs, new boiler and double glazed windows.
EPC B is a different matter.
It's still a brilliant business - rental income and capital appreciation.

Yeah I’d rather hand my £1325 over to John Lewis than my landlord in the Middle East.

No, a significant proportion of the amateur landlords just pay the interest on the mortgage and pocket everything else. This level of greed is why when circumstances change they are immediately squealing.

Lol not a fan of landlords? I'm in the process of selling my buy to let. It's in a conservation area, so I am unable to change the front of the house. I also don't want to put internal insulation in as it would make a very small room even smaller.

I don't have a mortgage, so interest rate rises haven't affected my decision. You sound quite bitter.

No you misread me, I am a commercial landlord (factory units). I own both my residential and commercials outright.
"You sound quite bitter" - no not at all, but I am passionate about the negative effects over leveraging of residential property has caused. I am pro landlord ( those that can actually afford to be landlords ) but quite anti amateur debt monkey types that have over inflated the residential market pricing out ordinary buyers. It has been very detrimental and I will be glad to see them flushed out.
As a genuine outright owner Landlord yourself - you know I speak the truth, even if it doesn't sit well..

Yes indeed, lots of other countries have restrictions on foreign ownership and/or put obstacles in the way.

over inflated the residential market pricing out ordinary buyers
Just some landlords to blame for house prices?...Nothing to do with crap wages, bank of mum and dad, COVID grants etc?
I know several wealthy people who passed on inheritance, COVID grants and pension lump sums to get their dc on the property ladder.

That massively screws things up for the ordinary buyers.

So what do you suggest people who’ve worked for their money do with it on death? Give it to a stranger??

And renters will be any more delighted to hand over their hard earned cash to big faceless conglomerate landlords who don't give a shit?

Is that more ethical now?

What's the alternative to either of these when there's virtually no social housing?

The point around foreign ownership is interesting - I’d assume that the corporates would be more likely to be foreign owned via equity etc than the average BTL landlord

We rent and are terrified. Landlords can essentially put up the rent to whatever they like at the moment as there is no leverage for tenants - there's nowhere to move to. It angers me that so many people are going to be paying massive rents and/or struggle to find somewhere to live because so many other people decided to over-leverage themselves with interest only mortgages.

We're a married couple in our forties and realistically we might have to consider whether to look at moving into a room in a shared house as a couple, and where we are that would still be £1k as well as making it near impossible to work from home. I honestly don't know what we're going to do long-term.

Our parents worked for their money, their work just wasn't valued enough for them to be able to give us tens of thousands of pounds to buy somewhere of our own. That's what they meant by skewed...if you can't inherit or be gifted money, as with most people, you're at a massive disadvantage.

Calm down...of course not, we're not, we've just started spending and giving our money away. Just pointing out the impact it has when people are constantly trying to blame landlords.

@YouHaveAnArse I was given nothing and managed to build a portfolio £1 mill plus put my son through public school and can near enough retire now I have a hobby business that I love and a horse. Not everyone is given £ and no not been in a highly paid career atall

3 former rental houses came up for sale in our village earlier this year. They've all been sold to first time buyers

@Parsley1234 That's uncommon, though, and doubly so if you weren't fortunate enough to be in a position to do that when rates were at historic lows. Good for you and your tenants, who I'm sure will also be able to retire. (Also totally brilliant to read about the generational wealth you've built and your horse when worrying about whether we can afford to live in the city in which we work is making me physically ill, but let's not say that lest anyone accuse me of sounding bitter)