Critic blames landlords for charging excessive rents but ignores rising costs they face

A blog blames landlords for “charging excessive rent prices” and for taking a “disproportionate amount of income from renters”.

Writing on his blog Funding for the Future, Richard Murphy claims “landlords are charging excessive prices” and points to data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showing that the cost of rental property in proportion to people’s gross incomes rose by 3% in 2023/24.

However, the blog fails to mention that landlord costs have also risen, as a combination of uncertainties from the Renters’ Rights Bill and EPC C targets push landlords to leave the market.

Landlords are charging excessive prices

Mr Murphy points to figures from the ONS suggesting that in London, rents now consume more than 40% of the gross income of renters.

Mr Murphy says on his blog: “Landlords are taking a disproportionate amount of the income of younger and poorer people who are living in rental property.

“Those  people are not working for the sake of putting food on the table. They’re not working for the sake of having a good life. They’re working to pay their landlords.

“It’s wrong that people are being denied a chance to live on median earnings because so much of what they earn is being extracted from them by landlords who are charging excessive prices.”

Lay the fault entirely at the door of the excessive prices of rental properties

Mr Murphy adds landlords are to blame for charging too high rents and calls for rent caps to be introduced.

He says: “We  can’t live forever in a society where rents are literally dragging people into real poverty after tax and after paying for the essentials of living, where they cannot work out how to make ends meet.

“It’s unsurprising that we have millions of children in poverty in this country as a consequence. You could lay the fault entirely at the door of the excessive prices of rental properties.

“Unless our government gets a grip on this issue, and it can only get a grip on this issue by either imposing rent caps or by increasing the number of government owned properties, whether that be government or housing association or local authority, I’m not too worried about, but under government control, unless more of those properties are made available at genuine social rents, there is no chance of this changing.”

Overlooks the facts

However, the blog fails to mention that landlords are also facing rising costs and challenges. As previously reported on Property118, EPC C upgrades will cost landlords thousands of pounds. It also overlooks the fact that the median gross income for landlords is around £25,000 before expenses, with 41% earning less than £20,000.

Landlords and letting agents are also set to bear the brunt of the £33 million cost of the Renters’ Rights Bill, with the impact assessment suggesting tenants will benefit by just £28 per household per year.