Sellers cut their asking house prices by an average of £3,832 in July as political uncertainty, higher mortgage costs and an unusually distracting summer weighed on England’s housing market, Rightmove reveals. The 1% monthly drop took the average price of a newly listed home to £372,359. July usually brings a seasonal decline, but the latest […]

Landlords could face longer possession delays and tougher council enforcement during the second half of 2026. That’s the view of Allison Thompson, the chief lettings officer at Leaders, who adds that the sector has continued to operate successfully despite repeated economic shocks and regulatory changes. She adds that the Renters’ Rights Act, weaker economic growth […]

The PRS Database stopped being an abstraction this summer. The government has been beta-testing its “Register your rental property” service with real landlords, who registered actual properties and were issued a Landlord Registration Number and a Property Registration Number. The shape of the live system is now reasonably clear, and the rollout is planned to […]

Six tenants have been ordered to pay a landlord £3,240 after a tribunal found four examples of unreasonable conduct in a withdrawn rent repayment order (RRO) claim worth about £60,000. The case unravelled over a licensing period that did not exist. The First-tier Tribunal found the east London HMO had been licensed throughout the tenants’ […]

Despite cutting affordable housing targets in the capital, London is still falling far short of its housing delivery goals, according to new findings. The London Assembly’s annual Housing Monitor report reveals housing targets have been missed and housing waiting lists continue to soar. Last year, the government announced new emergency measures to tackle London’s housebuilding […]

Dear HMRC, On 1 July 2026, HMRC amended several pages of its Business Income Manual dealing with interest relief, business funding and the withdrawal of capital by proprietors. The pages affected included BIM45690, “Funding the business”, BIM45700, “Withdrawal of capital from a business”, and related guidance concerning capital accounts and Silk v Fletcher. These pages […]

The government has claimed there is “no one-size-fits-all” approach for landlords when determining whether a tenancy is suitable, despite measures being introduced to tackle discrimination in the PRS. In a written parliamentary answer, Labour peer Baroness Taylor of Stevenage claimed the government have taken action to stop rental discrimination. Under the Renters’ Rights Act, it […]

Two stories this week caught my landlord eye, and they deserve to sit side by side for a closer analysis, because nobody in the housing debate seems willing to put them there. For years, landlords (especially me) have warned that punishing the private rented sector (PRS) would backfire on the very people policymakers claim to […]

Landlords could face higher costs and a further squeeze on housing supply if the incoming Prime Minister Andy Burnham turns to property and personal assets to fund new policies. The warning comes from David Alexander, the chief executive of DJ Alexander Scotland, who is urging Mr Burnham to proceed cautiously amid discussion of wealth taxes, […]

England’s councils are collecting only a fraction of fines issued for landlord offences, even as local authority inspection numbers grow. The National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) says councils are carrying out more checks under the Housing, Health and Safety Rating System. However, the collection of financial penalties continues to lag. Responsible landlords ‘clobbered’ The NRLA’s […]

Leaseholders remain trapped by rising costs and are unable to sell their homes, despite the government’s Leasehold and Freehold Act. Propertymark’s leasehold still a life sentence report reveals that progress on leasehold reform has been slow, with estate agents continuing to struggle to sell leasehold properties. The news comes as the government has announced further […]

Buy to let lending rose during the first three months of 2026, with landlords securing 58,272 new loans worth £10.8 billion, data from UK Finance reveals. Even with higher BTL borrowing costs, both figures were higher than a year earlier. UK Finance said the number of advances increased by 3.26% compared with the first quarter […]

With the Renters’ Rights Act, Making Tax Digital and tougher Right to Rent checks, landlords could be forgiven for thinking everything is becoming more complicated. Every new rule, deadline or compliance requirement can feel like another problem to deal with, and for landlords already thinking about scaling down or leaving the sector, selling a buy-to-let […]

More than 850,000 properties have left the private rented sector in the last decade as small landlords struggle with the Renters’ Rights Act, according to new data. Findings by TwentyEA reveal one in five homes that were rented at some point in the last 10 years have since been sold and not returned to the […]

Advertised rents have reached record highs in London and the rest of Great Britain after the number of available homes fell below last year’s level for the first time since 2022. Rightmove says the average advertised rent outside the capital rose by 1.9% during the second quarter to £1,397 a month, the first quarterly record […]

A barrister has warned that England’s new £7,000 disrepair fines may do little to reduce the number of housing claims brought against landlords. Jeffrey Zitron says limited council resources and continued reliance on existing complaints routes mean the legal landscape is unlikely to change much. The government estimates that around one in 10 privately rented […]

More than 200,000 landlords and sole traders have yet to sign up for Making Tax Digital (MTD), with the first quarterly deadline now less than a month away. Research commissioned by business management platform Tide found that 25% of landlords and sole traders earning more than £50,000 had not registered with HMRC for the new […]

Hello, I commissioned a London-based fire risk assessor to undertake an assessment of the communal area of my terraced property in North London. There are 2 self contained flats. The ground floor has 2 bedrooms, and the first floor has 3 bedrooms which includes a loft conversion. The ground floor tenants were out when he […]

Social housing landlord Notting Hill Genesis has lost an appeal over its attempt to charge shared owners at a Battersea block for facilities serving private flats elsewhere on the estate. The dispute turned on the wording of the leases, and that wording proved decisive. The Upper Tribunal ruled that shared owners in block V1 at […]

Landlords have grown used to bad news under the Renters’ Rights Act, but the suggestion that tenants could be awarded up to £25,000 through the new Private Rented Sector Ombudsman scheme appears to have touched a particular nerve. It is not just the size of the potential award that has caused alarm. It is what […]

Landlords could be required to pay tax every month under Treasury proposals that would calculate deductions using income declared in the previous year, the Daily Telegraph reports. The move comes after the controversial Making Tax Digital (MTD) is already forcing thousands of property owners into a new quarterly reporting regime. The government is consulting on […]