Addressing the Under Supply of UK Rental Housing

all this makes total sense.

Only problem is, the people who make the rules don't actually care.

We are stuck in a 'pass the buck and screw everyone else, but be seen to be helping at the same time' culture.

A bad workman always blames his tools...

I think you've made a mistake about the intentions of Govt. The objective is not to do with the supply of safe homes, its to do with nudging more landlords toward selling up to increase the number of owner occupiers, which the Govt equates with Tory voters.

Sadly one of the problems is to do with minimum room sizes in HMOs. We are selling 5 properties because of the council applied minimum room size if no lounge (10m in 2 councils), evicting 20 tenants. Yet this rule means there would be at least one empty room in each property, reducing supply to those who can least afford it. We cannot have this so are selling. An attack on landlords is an attack on tenants.

Dear DSR
Wel said .

Brilliant summary.
It politicians interest to be seen to be doing good but are in fact
1) pass the bucket
2) screw everyone -
3) seen to be doing good
But please all landlords keep fighting for what you worked for .
Keep fighting for s21 or similar atleast.
Landlords paid thousands to get on ladder and now having to sell and pay all back in CGT or IHT
All plans of retirement gone
NEVER GIVE UP.
STAND UNITED AND FIGHT FOR WHAT YOU HAVE SCARIFICED.
ALL LANDLORD WILL AGREE LETTING HAS NEVER BEEN EASY . ITS BLOOD , SWEAT AND SCRIFICE.

Very well summarised. I wrote to my local MP (Mr Raab) in 2016 explaining exactly this. I still have the response from the Treasury at the time. This is an extract; "Given that only a small proportion of the housing market is affected by this change, the government does not expect these changes to have a large impact on either house prices or rent levels" Try telling the tenants who are suffering the increase in rents because of the lack of supply. Clearly the government learnt nothing from Mrs Thatcher 30 odd years ago who was responsible for creating a rental market at that time.

Reply to the comment left by David at 25/05/2022 - 09:10
David is correct….. the government wants home owners and a PRS that is institutionally owned…. Look at the relaxation of listing conditions for REITs following FA 2022 the massive growth of build to rent…. If I was being cynical I would argue that it is all political parties that want home ownership for the electorate. And as Maggie won over swathes of traditional Labour voters by offering them ownership of their Council House…. It has been proven to be a vote winner…. Just like Landlord bashing!!

I love the balance and reciprocity in your points.

A good point you made that I had not considered was about non landlord standards.
If a standard of housing must be met, it must be met for all home owners. Otherwise its not a standard, or not worth the money to implement.

A homeowner can keep their house in the worst possible overcrowded state and not have a problem.
But if a landlord breaches a standard the tenant is more than happy to accept the government pokes its nose in and says its not ok.

It shows up clearly the government is playing favourites, and we are not the favourite ones.

Reply to the comment left by Mark Crampton Smith at 25/05/2022 - 17:22I couldn't agree more with your first sentence. The government are clearly on a path to eliminate the individual private landlord and stimulate corporate investment in identikit housing for the sections of the population who want or are obliged to rent. This stems from their conviction that home owners vote Conservative. However, I am not so sure about all political parties wanting universal home ownership. Clearly there are sections of the community (students and youngsters just leaving the parental home, for instance) for whom home ownership is impracticable, unsuitable or unattainable There are some who do not want the responsibility of maintenance of a building and others who cannot face the prospect of mortgage debt. Indeed, it is arguable that the trend amongst today's young people is to hire everything they need or have it delivered to them on demand so they can live a life of instant gratification and freedom from responsibility.
As for imposing on home owners all the restrictions and requirements demanded of landlords who provide living accommodation for others, surely it is those very freedoms to live as they please in their own homes that make the idea of home ownership so attractive to tenants. (Read the letters from Mick Roberts's tenants if you doubt this.) Life is a succession of risks and childhood is the time to gradually learn to live with and deal with those risks. We cannot cocoon the entire population from the cradle to the grave and it would be foolish and counter-productive to try.

Nicely put.

The "German system" used to be often quoted as an ideal solution largely because it was difficult to move a tenant out of a property. We seem to be moving towards that part of the "German System" now.

But what is missing are all the incentives for landlords which come along with that German system. Annual depreciation allowance of the building (2% of build cost or value, I think). Inheritance tax tapering to zero after however many years. All costs including all finance fully tax deductible. etc etc.. I may be a little out of date now but you get the general point.

Reply to the comment left by Dr Monty Drawbridge at 26/05/2022 - 16:35
Indeed Dr Monty...... The German system has evolved since the war, and even there they are trying to reduce the number of Private Landlords in the market; more Germans are now living in owner occupation than 10 years ago and the majority of rented accommodation is owned by pension funds and other financial institutions.
Here, we are of course going to throw the baby out with the bathwater; all of my nearly 500 landlord clients are highly responsible; respond quickly to changes in the need for accommodation locally, and entirely mindful that for the occupant the property is a home. I would argue that small scale landlords buying wisely and in clear areas of need, is a much more efficient mechanism that large scale build to rent homogenous "lifestyle" developments, for delivering an effective PRS. Managing the "rouge landlords" as they have come to be know has been a political issue since Peter Rachman in the '50s and '60s, and despite the fact that even Shelter acknowledge they are a minority the expedient political solution has led to the indiscriminate persecution of the private landlord.