Lib Dem 2017 Manifesto for the PRS

The Lib Dem 2017 Manifesto ‘Change Britain Future’ decribes the rental market as becoming unaffordable along with house prices and says that young people in particular need help.

The Lib Dem Manifesto says they will change the Private Rental sector by:

• Promote longer tenancies of three years or more with an inflation-linked annual rent increase built in, to give tenants security and limit rent hikes. (ie. Rent Controls)
• Give tenants first refusal to buy the home they are renting from a landlord who decides to sell during the tenancy at the market rate according to an independent valuation.
• Improve protections against rogue landlords through mandatory licensing and allow access for tenants to the database of rogue landlords and property agents.
• Help young people into the rental market by establishing a new Help to Rent scheme to provide government-backed tenancy deposit loans for all first-time renters under 30.
• Help people who cannot afford a deposit by introducing a new Rent to Own model where rent payments give tenants an increasing stake in the property, owning it outright after 30 years.
• Improve renting by banning lettings fees for tenants, capping upfront deposits and increasing minimum standards in rented homes.
• Give British buyers a fair chance by stopping developers advertising homes abroad before they have been advertised in the UK.
• End the scandal of rough sleeping by increasing support for homelessness prevention and adequately funding age-appropriate emergency accommodation and supported housing, while ensuring that all local authorities have at least one provider of the Housing First model of provision for long-term, entrenched homeless people.

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