Newbie to PRS?

What a lot of these landlords threatening to leave the sector seem to miss is that their departure will have zero impact on the number of bedrooms available. Hopefully all these properties coming to the market at once will reduce the crazy house prices and give some of our youngsters the chance to own their own home (as we all did\).

Reply to the comment left by Londonlad at 22/01/2024 – 09:14
Can’t agree with you there, its a nice thought but most of the older disgruntled portfolio landlords will not be party to a fire sale, they have too much equity and too high a level of CGT to sell en masse at huge discount. It will be a slow and steady reduction but a constant drip feed into the market.

Reply to the comment left by robert fisher at 22/01/2024 – 09:27
Even landlords selling one property will have affect though, with prices already falling in most areas. The CGT saving by selling one a year would be £840 with the risk of labour removing the threshold altogether. Hardly a great reason to stay if this business is so awful ? Don’t get me wrong, a lot of the legislation is onerous but there is still good money to be made for professional landlords but I think we have definitely seen the end of the free ride for amateur buy-to-letters

Hi, I don’t think £390 would go far in London. I have 3 flats for sale in Worthing, west Sussex. Two one bed and one two bed, stable tenants, £390 would buy them and return any investor £1950 pm and the assistance of an experienced landlord to start you off. This is a conversion I did in 2007, two flats to four, with me doing all the work. So experienced in building

Where should you invest? Don’t bother. If I were you, with £390k cash, I’d put a bit in bitcoin, various bank accounts, and even on a measly 5.5%, you could make £21,450 pa with just interest alone… no stress, no nonsense, no lettings fees, no tenants … per month thats £1787.50 … all yours to enjoy… look around as some places are offering more than 5.5%,but I’m just thinking about instant access accounts. Property as ‘an investment’ has to be managed like a business. The fact that you’re coming into money, tells me that you need to be very careful because it sounds like you’ve not had a sum like this before. Nor have you been able to save up this sum before. I’m not sure why you’ve got your heart set on London, but I think its quite a risky strategy to put it all on one flat, and all reliance on one person to pay the rent… if I was convinced to go into property, I’d be buying out of London, and trying to get at LEAST 5 houses, up north – so that I’m spreading my risk. But thats me. I’d rather have 5-10 houses up north, than just 1 flat in London. London is a rip off.

Don’t do it.

Don’t put all the cash into buying the property… keep about £50k back as a war chest you are going to need when you get a troublesome tenant – it’s not if but when you get one and unless you can handle stress – a lot sometimes – then I would push as much of my money in my pension and savings.

The rental game is no longer for the faint hearted and long gone are the days if just thinking you can collect rent every month… it’s a proper business now wether you have a single or multiple properties.
You have to make tough decisions and not think with the heart – but be fair.

Even using an agent can bring issues you have to make sure they are completing paperwork correctly that you may need to rely on when you need to evict. I hear a lot of issues blaming the agent but your running a business now when renting so the buck stops with you and you have to understand legislation and when you need to serve documents and what documents to send correctly with all proof of delivery that a court would accept.

Good luck if you go for it im a portfolio landlord for about 30 years so am properly prepared for the new rules – or as best I can be.

Put your money in an ISA and forget about PRS or becoming a landlord. Much less hassle and less chance of losing anything

Fascinating reading through the responses, but I notice it’s now 12 months on from the original post and I cant help but wonder what the original poster decided to do? Would love an update!

(I’m another landlord who exited – sold 5 flats after 15 years due to the rapidly escalating out of control service fees, cladding scandal, leasehold scandal with well hidden catch you out multiplying ground rents, fee’s, etc, and increasingly rouge tenants that appeared to take less and less care of the apartments.)

I thought I’d accidentally found an old post, but yes, it would be interesting to see what they decided to do. It resonated a bit as my flats in London suburbs (Zone 4) are around that price, £280-£300,000. Studios and one beds. Rent is around £1000 for the studio and £1200 for the one beds. I see the attraction of wanting a ‘bolthole’ in London but if you need an agent to manage it, be careful as people above have said. I live near to my flats so self manage. Most agents are expensive and not very good. You’ll need at least £50k contingency fund. In 7 years I’ve done 3 new roofs and 5 new boilers, two exterior refurbs and had two tenants not pay rent until I could remove them 10 months later. I had mortgages so really not worth it. I’ve now sold 5 of my 8 flats and looking forward to not being on call 24/7. It was my sole income too so not enough to live on as costs went up. Make sure you get guarantors for your tenants. It’s not a job for the faint hearted. Let us know how you’ve got on.