Summer Budget 2015 – Landlords Reactions

Reply to the comment left by "Mark Alexander" at "09/09/2015 - 12:07":

PS - I simply cannot believe that homeowners would vote for a reduction in the value of their home. Try negotiating a discount off sale price. The survey is a farce!
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Email received from the Director of spareroom today:

'Hi Ros,

Thanks for the update.

We're planning to draft a newsletter about the changes to send to our landlords. We won't go as far as emailing everyone and asking them to sign the petition, as we have a policy of not endorsing third party petitions, but we'll certainly flag this up and make sure landlords know what's going on.

Thanks

Matt'

Reply to the comment left by "Mark Alexander" at "08/09/2015 - 20:56":

Mark, splendid job! You have certainly bought James's emotions at surface.

Far too long this chap enjoyed the plight of hardworking landlords who put their blood and sweat to run their business whereas this person enjoyed passing cold hearted remarks to get into our blood stream.

If I had my way, I would have terminated his account long ago.

Justice well served.

Reply to the comment left by "Saeef Khan" at "09/09/2015 - 14:10":

Hmm....I always suspected James was founder of HPC.

However, he claimed, he was founder of House Recovery Dot Com.........:-)

Reply to the comment left by "Saeef Khan" at "09/09/2015 - 14:38":

HPC is owned by Fubra Limited - details https://www.duedil.com/company/03967214/fubra-limited
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I think the Times journalist took an interesting angle in his article. I have just this morning been working out how to squeeze a bit more out of my BTLs. Up to now I've been happy for them to tick along - it hasn't interested me to completely maximise my returns.
Things have now drastically changed, so I am looking at each of my larger student houses to see how I can fit more rooms into them. Obviously they will all have to be of a legal size as they are already HMOs or in the process of being classified as such. Eg. with a 5-let house, I could move a wall or two and make it a 6-bed, for just a few thousand pounds. With some 4-beds, I could put in a loft conversion and make them 5 or 6 beds. I reckon for an investment of about £20,000 on one house, I could get an additional return of about £6,000 pa.
So the journalist's comment about 'Bedsit Britain' had some truth to it,although mine are shared houses rather than bedsits. As others have mentioned I think this will be one of the key evasive tactics we can adopt if we don't want the Government to drive us out of business and/or bankrupt us.
And for anyone who thinks this is somehow mercenary and not the way to provide housing, they should look at the figures we're having to look at - paying income tax on non-existent income... Some of us have been around for a long time and you don't stay in business by not adapting to the times (I sound a bit like CJ now! - for those who don't know, I'm referring to a famous sitcom).
I don't think this will work in other areas however, where I have 2-bed houses as I don't think there would be so much demand for this kind of shared housing. The only way to go there is to up the rents as far as possible, I think.
Has anyone else got any ideas on this? And/or what are other people's plans to maximise income? Obviously, now when I do renovations - I have to do one now after a tenant was evicted and has left it full of her rubbish and furniture and in a disgusting state - I will be sourcing cheaper materials. I was going to laminate it throughout, but I recently found a very nice lino that looks like laminate (which of course looks like wood....) which I put into the bathroom and shower rooms in my ex-cannabis factory/nearly burnt down by the tenants house. It was cheap and looks fabulous. Also, where I would have ripped out the kitchen and put in a new one, I'll do things like keep the carcasses, scrub them clean and paint the cupboard doors. It might be good to have a thread on this - ways forward, doing stuff on the cheap, maximising returns etc. I'd be happy to start it, if there's not already an old one on this topic. Maybe Mark can remember?

Reply to the comment left by "Mark Alexander" at "09/09/2015 - 14:52":

And, rather interestingly, ourproperty.co.uk, which I for one use for due diligence on sold prices.

Reply to the comment left by "Mark Shine" at "08/09/2015 - 21:02":

I am an IT Freelancer when I'm not being a landlord, but , unlike that poster I'm trying to run a business not be a bum on a seat in some big corporate. My usual gig a one day training course at around £200 a day including travel for some where big or the odd hour here and there for a small business or "person", plus I do copy editing and proofreading (again, how much depends on how long the book is). I have no 6 month contracts on huge salaries. The company doesn't make enough to pay any dividends, so my wages are all PAYE. It's not as uncommon as all that amongst those of us who want to be businesses not pretend employees. I make more as a landlord than as a freelancer (or I used to ....).

Reply to the comment left by "Mark Alexander" at "09/09/2015 - 12:09":

I can easily believe that turkeys vote for Christmas. All they think about it "Ooh, it will be cheaper for me to buy a new, bigger house" not "Eek, I can't sell my house because I won't get enough money from the sale to pay off the mortgage"