Government denies Renters’ Rights Bill will harm rental market

Quote “Mr Pennycook claims the government has engaged with landlords and property investors and will not undermine confidence in the market”

What planet is this idiot living on?

I guess the only landlords he has spoken to are his friends in the BTR group where the laws don’t apply to them.

The government want rid of the PRS and hand it over to their friends in the BTR sector.

I wonder if the BTR companies will take on people on Housing benefit?

I guess that Raynor had better start building those 1.5 million homes she promised

He doesn’t care. End of. It’s a vote winning strategy. Nothing more. Give the renters what he thinks they want to hear. Appease the Shelter et call and their cronies and the far left. Appease the same ones that didn’t want benefit reform.
The reality is the homeless stats are going to go up as a direct result of the RRB. The housing lists can only ever increase. They can only ever decrease when there is accommodation available
The legislation has always been pitched at powers to favour existing renters – to make them secure. Ban S21 being the biggest focus of all. Stop evictions where no reason is stated. It as NEVER been to increase the amount of accommodation at all.
Ultimately he, nor any legislation can really control the process by where a LL chooses a tenant. The tenants circumstances dictate that – which is all down to the tenant no one else. Round hold/square peg scenario.
Bearing in mind there are practically zero/very few properties that are for rent at exactly LHA rates, then you could argue that any property is properly UNaffordable for benefit tenants because the other benefits they may receive are given specifically for other things and not directly the rent.
A tenant paying a top up only means their ‘income’ is being displaced – this will mean they have less to pay on C/T, utility bills etc. This links nicely into homes not being heated correctly and claims of mould etc…
Given each property has an EPC, and lists the ‘average’ consumption of gas/electric, this says to me that this is also what is deemed as needed to keep the home healthy. If I look at a tenants income and therefore work out the cost of that ‘average’ heating and it is unaffordable…
I know that Councils when assessing tenants general ‘affordability’ for things like DHP’s look directly at utility bill costs and so for the purposes of parity….I think private landlords should actively do the same when considering if a rented is truly affordable for the tenant presented – especially if they are on limited income from the state.

Smashing the landlords as smashing the gangs failed

Politicians never lie, so how is Pennycook going to spin the mayhem which will result from the RRA?

Dear Mr Pennycook
You are wrong. Please see the following article and the one after that, both on the 118 site today (and many others before it):
The first, “Landlords continue to sell as 290,000 homes lost from the PRS” is independent data-led research by property professionals, not anecdotal or blinkered made up stories like some of those we hear from Shelter, Generation Rent and the like. Real facts, whether you like it or not.
By the way, stop ‘baiting’ PRS LLs by saying that ‘good landlords have nothing to fear from the bill’. It’s the bad tenants and the lack of measures available for dealing with them that is driving GOOD LLs out of the sector. The BAD LLs will remain and continue to flout the law, as some of them have done for years, but without having faced enforcement action. That’s where your answer lies, not in punishing and encouraging good LLs to leave the PRS.

Reply to the comment left by Freda Blogs at 14/07/2025 – 11:20Your third para is spot on. All the good guys are off, only the t@rds will remain on the beach when the tide goes out.

Just like how adding vat to schools wouldn’t cause schools to close.

Just the threat of the Renters Rights Bill and what it contains has already harmed the rental market. It will be carnage when the full contents of the Bill are understood.

Pennycrook has to say the RRB is the best thing since sliced bread – he can’t say anything else, he could hardly say it’s a load of cr@p that’d be a first i.e. a politician telling the truth.

Matthew Pennycook asserts that landlords are not leaving the sector seems to fly in the face of the facts. If he’s wrong and the sector is adversely affected then he may pay the price with a rather short career. More to the point, tenants will still need housing and Landlords will be in shorter supply. Hapless renters will pay dearly in higher rents and more rigorous selection, because landlords understandably won’t stand for losing money. So landlords will survive and those who hold their nerve will pull through.

As a landlord am I happy that my future is secure? No, our government is overtaxing and over regulating the supply of houses to those who can least afford this unnecessary punishment. It’s not much fun, the majority of good landlords are being vilified and it’s now difficult to feel any sense of satisfaction in the job.

It’s a bold gamble Mr Pennycook motivated more by left wing politics than business sense. I really hope you’re right but I doubt it.