Keir Starmer: Not all landlords are evil

"As you know private landlords are often getting tenants or would-be tenants to bid against each other in an upward spiral and that means rent goes up and up and up.”

I think that this statement 'landlords are getting tenants to bid against each other' shouldn't have been presented as fact, unchallenged. It's not landlords that are getting tenants to bid against each other in my experience; it's tenants that are bidding against each other in an attempt to secure the best properties, or any property. It's no different to buying a property with sealed bids in Scotland.

This phenomenon of escalating rents is being driven by tenant demand and a failure of supply.

Gratifying that after saving the bacon of the social housing crisis for decades, that there is considered >= 1 landlord not thought of as "evil". I wonder if Labour have carried out any research on the evil/non-evil ratio?

I suppose "not all evil" is the best political stance we've had for the last 9 years or so, so it's a tiny step in the right direction, as is being damned with (very) faint praise.

George Osborne promised to fix the roof while the sun was shining. This was certainly not the case for the PRS where he not only stripped the lead but came back for the chimney pots and aerial.

As a result of the constant fiscal and regulatory attacks on the PRS, it's little wonder that so many landlords have already sold properties, resulting in the shortage of stock which forces prices up.

Labour need to focus on getting the courts working and delivering the details of what they propose for EPCs, the Property Portal and Ombudsman before they think about setting a date for ending S21.

Reply to the comment left by Rod at 01/07/2024 - 10:49agreed, but that's the sensible solution. They probably know to stay in after this first 5 year term then need to show 'results' rapidly - they know straight off, there are a significant amount of labour voters are not giving them the head job because they believe in them and what they stand for - it a Tory backlash. After all there is nothing behind the boring 'change' PR, promises and ideas is there...
Just think how long they will be able to bang on/milk it about scrapping S21 and giving tenants more security etc by beating the Tories to it.
All this is is a feather in Starmers cap. He will be under pressure to deliver as soon as he gets in. That's where the danger is. Not what the puppet wants, it's down to the puppet masters....
They wont have a hope in hell of sorting the court system out so that wont even be mentioned.

Reply to the comment left by Rod at 01/07/2024 - 10:49
Labour also need to understand that when the government stopped small, unincorporated landlords (the majority) from being able to offset their interest payments against rental income this had the effect of attacking supply and that as interest rates climbed this policy also drove rent inflation along with the increased competition between tenants for properties.

As for Keir Starmer's comments: “Young people or people who want to buy their own home are paying a massive amount of their income in rent, and we have to stop that happening. There are very huge deposits as well that are being taken from people.....the rents are just going up because there are more people who need to rent than there are places to rent, and the prices are just going through the roof."

Some of Keir Starmer's comments are true but it is because the UK governments have attacked supply at a time when more supply was required (not just of new-build properties). The worst offender of the UK governments was the SNP government in Scotland and all parties need to learn from that.

Where will the money come from to build 1500000 new homes come from?
The gerneral population want a house with a garden and not multistorey council flats.
A dual purpose elevator/urinal is not needed nor are neighbours with big dogs and asbo's.
The Government borrowing is close to gross domestic product. There is very little headroom for Government borrowing,
Where will the money come from?
He will need to tax incentivise investors!

Reply to the comment left by david porter at 01/07/2024 - 11:15
I agree that he will need to incentivise investors; at the very least he will need to incentivise investment in energy efficient residential property. The problem he's got is that he may have recognised that: "...There’s nothing against your property and being a landlord and nothing wrong with setting a good rent that gives you a good income....Many people do it on a big or a small scale as a pension safeguard...."

But the left-wing of his party are going to want to attack capital investment. They don't care about attacking investments because they believe in public ownership and public as opposed to private pensions anyway and if they create a crisis they believe they can solve it by sequestration of assets. The only place where there is sufficient money to attack is in residential property and pensions.

But rather than allowing the left-wing of his party to attack the houses and pensions of UK citizens, if he really wanted the nation to build 1,500,000 new homes then he might as well let us do it in a SIPP wrapper. He's already recognised that people invest in residential property as a 'pension safeguard'.

Keir Starmer got his own 'pension safeguard' when he got a special "tax unregistered" pension scheme when he stood down as Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) in 2013.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-65037136

The majority of UK citizens don't get gilt-edged pensions like this. Their 'pension safeguards' are under attack.

How generous of Starmer to say not all landlords are evil.By that does he mean most are! Isn't evil rather a strong word to use just because a landlord wants the best price.
So by that all bidding wars then are "evil" such as getting the best price when you sell your house.
I suspect Starmer (Rayner) has plans to introduce a rent cap and we will be in a pure totalitarian Communist state which is rather what Sunak is hinting at.
I certainly don't want to be governed by those that tell me how much I am allowed to rent my property out for.

And all Labour MPs are not anti British, communist, blood sucking leaches.

Just to balance the headline.

Not all landlords are evil but all politicians are