Disgruntled tenants protested against soaring rents outside the National Landlord Investment Show in London this week.
Protestors accused buy-to-let landlords of “rampant profiteering”, with many chanting, “Landlords! Parasites!” outside the venue in the city.
While those protesting outside demanded rent freezes, buy-to-let investors inside the venue shared tips and advice on how to maximise returns from the private rented sector.
Kane Andrews, 34, an investor who operates more than 60 HMOs through his company, Rockstar, told an audience of property investors that his firm had made £2m tax free in 2022 from refinancing.
He told the press that the protest was “a shame”, adding that “we’re trying to help people.”
The City of London police stepped in when Ranjan Battacharya, a property investor and TV presenter, challenged the protesters’ claims.
“They are misguided and there’s a lack of understanding of what we do,” he said.
The members of the London Renters Union included Peter Wood, who said he and his wife had to move out of their home recently because the landlord wanted to increase the rent by £8,000 a year – a jump of more than 30%.
“I have a serious neurological health condition and I was getting regular attacks when the rent increase was served,” he said.
Across England, the Citizens Advice Bureau estimates more than 300,000 private renters have had to move out of their homes due to a real or threatened rent increase in the last year.
Landlords said they were dealing with rising interest rates, the planned Section 21 eviction ban and a tougher tax regime.
Daniel Paterson, who lets out nine properties in Greater Manchester with his father, Floyd, said they were expecting a four to five percentage point interest rate rise on the business’s debt next year. “The tenant will pick it up,” he said, “because there is so much demand you can pass it on.” But he added: “It’s not right.”
Oh dear!
More evidence of property gurus bringing our sector into disrepute.
People selling “get rich quick” property education are NOTHING to do with landlords in reality. They are “wealth creation gurus” and these people bring responsible and decent landlords into disrepute in my opinion.
I have fact check their misleading marketing, high pressure sales techniques, false claims, and non-fulfilment of training for over a decade, and, for my trouble, as many of you know, I am now facing the biggest defamation damages in the history of the UK courts – £5.4 million.
Unfortunately, MSM doesn’t differentiate between genuine and responsible landlords and “grifters” who are selling the “get rich quick” dream. Ironically, many people who were protesting outside the event will be sucked into paying for expensive and ineffective property training by these gurus selling the dream on social media. Their target audience is young and naive people who want to believe that you can buy a ticket to see a Unicorn.
I was shocked and disappointed when I saw how many of these property gurus were at the event and the kind of falsehoods they were peddling that bring responsible landlords into disrepute – I was there myself – but they have deep pockets through their dubious business model and can afford to exhibit at these shows. 🙁
As all at EYE know, property is not easy, or get rich quick, and also requires significant starting funds. These people just sell a dream on social media and they are totally unregulated, which makes them dangerous to consumers as well as bringing responsible landlords into disrepute.
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You would hope by now that govt, Shelter and the like would realise that a majority of private landlords have not, up until recently, imposed annual rent increases as per the tenancy contract.
We had many, many landlords who did not seek to increase rents annually and, in addition, gave rent freezes, rent holidays and in some cases rent rebates to tenants due to covid, ill health, unemployment, hardship, etc.
The reason that private landlords are seeking to increase rents now is not because they ‘want’ to, as reported above, it is because they HAVE to – due to increased taxation, regulation, mortgage costs, etc.
Otherwise, the only alternative is to sell the property which will remove another property from the private rental sector. When the PRS is dominated by professional landlords, then tenants will realise that there is zero leeway on when their rent review is enacted, what happens when they cannot make the rent payment on time, etc.
Protesting outside an event where the people attending are obviously the responsible landlords – the rogues apples in the barrel don’t go to those type of events, is ill-judged to say the least. If anything, it may well give those landlords second thoughts as to whether they expand, or even stay, in the PRS. Why would you when all you receive is added costs and harassment, when the alternative is more secure and more accessible interest from a savings account?
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The potential for profiteering really only happens as a market approaches a monopoly i.e. there are only a handful of participants, or perhaps if you have a dodgy privatised utility with a dodgy regulator (heaven forbid such to happen).
Hence it is nonsense in a market with as varied provision as the PRS. High rents reflect the market being a less viable place to participate as a supplier, along with net migration going parabolic on the demand side.
Whether these protesters believe this is the best use of their time, or they are being paid to do it by the lobby networks, it reflects badly on where the state central planners have brought us to.
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