Data launched at the British Property Federation's (BPF) Residential Conference this morning showed that almost nine in ten landlords (88.3%) would not reduce their rents to claimants, despite the raft of cuts to the housing benefit received by tenants announced by the government.
This flies in the face of government's key argument in favour of the changes – that landlords would reduce their rents in line with housing benefit cuts – and suggests that the high demand for homes in many areas will simply prompt landlords to instead let their properties to paying tenants.
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NetRent Comment
Private landlords are not charitable organisations and should not be expected to reduce rents to fit in with Government housing policies. Landlords are even more reluctant to listen to a Government that will not listen to them. If the Government re-introduced direct payment of Local Housing Allowance and seriously reduced the amount of red tape then perhaps landlords would be able to reduce rents, they would certainly be more willing to listen to the Government.
In addition to restoring direct LHA payments and reducing red tape the Government should also persuade the banks it now owns on our behalf to start lending to the Buy-to-Let market again. There are many landlords who would be pleased to expand their portfolios but cannot due to the restrictive lending criteria imposed by the 'nationalised' banks.
