Lettings News week commencing 19 September 2010

A fresh threat for embattled landlords

Loans limit will hamper buy-to-let

Landlord licensing fails tenants

Live-in landlords hit record levels

Landlords look forward to AST threshold increase

Husband and wife fined over gas safety breaches

Lorna Bourke: my top 10 tips for buy-to-let investors

Lettings News week commencing 12 September 2010

Lloyds restricts lending on buy-to-let portfolios

Landlords Benefit From Low Rent Voids

Rents 'at highest for two years' as landlords sell up

Tenants at risk from landlords, MP claims

Dodgy Fulham landlord's fine rises to £57,000

Your rights as a tenant

Buy-to-let landlords missing green tax breaks

Landlords call for government rethink on housing benefit cuts

Shelter's claims polarise the lettings industry

Claims made in a new campaign by the charity Shelter polarise the lettings industry in our opinion. Shelter claim that their survey indicates that nearly one million tenants have been the victims of landlord scams.

Their campaign called Evict Rogue Landlords is designed to highlight the fact that there are rogue landlords operating in the UK. We agree, there are clearly rogue landlords out there but there are also rogue tenants, something Shelter's campaign ignores.

We spoke to Shelter today and they confirmed that most landlords are decent and honest. They claim that the intention behind the campaign is to make tenants aware of their rights and responsibilities. However, their headline of one million scammed tenants has been picked up and reported on by many media outlets. Those media outlets, and Shelter, have not balanced the case by pointing out that many landlords have had serious issues with tenants, ranging from non-payment of rent to cannabis farms. Based on the Shelter campaign the media has portrayed the lettings industry as full of rogue landlords scamming innocent tenants.

NetRent.co.uk believe that this type of campaign is exactly what the lettings industry does not need because it polarises the industry into us and them. Bad landlords and bad tenants are both equally bad for everyone in the lettings industry. Singling out the bad in one group out and ignoring the bad in the other group just creates division and mistrust. Landlords and tenants need to work together to weed out the rogues.

Shelter should be working to promote good letting between landlords and tenants, not working hard to promote the impression that landlords are untrustworthy thieves with tenants as their innocent victims. That impression does nothing to foster good landlord/tenant relations and simply serves to polarise the lettings industry.

Click here to view the Shelter campaign Evict Rogue Landlords

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Lettings News week commencing 5 September 2010

Top Ten Buy to Let Mortgages

Almost one million people victim of landlord scams

Student HMO planning rules scrapped by minister

Housing Benefit changes could cause homelessness

House rental demand outstrips supply

Rental Rules - What does a Landlord need to Learn?

Grant Shapps: Sensible approach to manage shared homes

Councils crack down on HMO landlords

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Lettings News week commencing 29 August 2010

New AST's for landlords come in next month

Rent caps could leave 340,000 homeless

Landlord confidence falls for first time in 2 years

Bad news for landlords

Fake Chelsea landlord jailed for 3 years

Mortgage approvals rise 0.3%

Lettings News week commencing 22 August 2010

The Top Ten Buy to Let Mortgages

Buy-to-let landlords' confidence knocked

Landlords fight county court closure plans

Row erupts over 'home from hell'

Good news for landlords as rental market finally picks up

Tenant demand fuels further rent rises, reveals RICS

Home ownership unachievable for millions, says CIH

Lettings News week commencing 15 August 2010

Insult to private landlords

The position of tenants when a landlord defaults on their mortgage

Desposit scheme fails to protect tenant's money?

Buy-to-let mortgage landlords 'entitled to check their properties'

Climate turns to favour landlords as FTBs shut out

Eviction fears for 37,000 ‘unless rents slashed’

Landlords gain from rise in rental income

The Top Ten Buy to Let Mortgages

The latest Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) buy-to-let figures

Andy Young, chief executive of Landlord Centre, our mortgage partners says, ‘It is encouraging to see a continuing trend of growth in the buy-to-let mortgage market and there have been some positive developments that have supported this, including the availability of products up to 80% loan to value, HMOs and limited companies. However we are clearly a long way from the levels of lending required to satisfy demand and the choice of products for landlords is still limited. Criteria remain tight and despite some new lenders entering the market, it will take the return of specialist lenders with wholesale funds to really inject some much-needed growth and competition into the market.’

‘It is a positive sign that remortgages accounted for over 40% of all buy-to-let mortgages in the first quarter of 2010 and reflects the availability of some competitively priced products in the market place, including specific remortgaging products offering free valuation and free legal fees which has enabled landlords to remortgage more readily. Landlord Centre has seen a steady growth in the remortgage market over the last three quarters, with 45% of apps received in the second quarter of 2010 for remortgages up from 41% in the first quarter and just 31% in the last quarter of 2009.’

‘As first-time buyers continue to struggle and more people are turning to the private rental sector, it is crucial that buy-to-let property investors have easier access to funding to satisfy the demand for quality rental accommodation. I am confident that the buy-to-let sector will continue to play a vital role in the provision of housing in the UK, but this must be supported by the availability of finance.’

For more information about But to Let Mortgages please click here Mortgages through NetRent.co.uk