Here’s a timely warning for property people who believe the tax man is a friendly and benign helper. Gill Orsmann was buying a house and spent some time scrutinising the conveyancing documents drafted by her solicitor.

London rents are 78% higher than those in the rest of the country, according to the latest figures from landlord insurer Homelet. The firm’s monthly index of private rents revealed the UK has two separate rental markets – London and the rest.

Property taxes in the UK are the highest in Europe, according to the latest figures issued by the European Union. The latest figures are for 2010, and show revenue flowing in to government coffers from property taxes varies widely across the continent.

This week’s edition features Neil Patterson going through much of the buy to let market changes, and also offers advice for buy to let investors. Mark Alexander wonders about Greece’s impact on the PRS and two new columnists offer their own handy advice.

Possession orders have been on the rise again, hitting a four year high back in March. Landlords appear to be changing tack though as possession without obtaining a money order claims have shot up by over 30%. The change is nationwide, with significant rises in Chelmsford (67%) and Luton (56%) to name but two.

The government is failing low income householders as buy to let rents rise, despite cutting housing benefits to try to stem the increases. A private rental market analysis by a housing groups is warning the government that rents are unaffordable in some areas for poorer families – and propose building more homes and supporting landlords […]

Homes going under the hammer at auctions are going up in value, but are still significantly below average house prices. April figures for homes sold at auction show 1,479 properties were sold for an average price of £101,060, according to auction monitor EI Group.

“When is the Bank of England base rate going up?” is the most frequent question I am asked by property investors. Not this year or next is how I assess the latest figures from the May Bank of England inflation report. Below are some of the key factors affecting the UK and Euro-zone along with […]

Having thought through the economic problems in Greece I have to ask the question, will Greeks mass migrate to the UK? In my opinion, Germany will eventually realise that supporting the Greek economy ad-infinitum just doesn’t make sense and will cut their losses and allow the Greek economy to fail. I also believe that point is very […]

Newham Council has completed stage one of a grandiose plan to licence 35,000 buy to let tenancies. The Labour-led council wants to become the first to achieve the milestone and is looking to extend a pilot scheme in the neighbourhood improvement zone of Little Ilford that has seen 257 licences issued.

A property firm’s claims that buy to let was a safe alternative to keeping money in a savings account were misleading, ruled the Advertising Standards Authority. THE ASA has banned the firm, Aldermartin Baines and Cuthbert, estate agents in Bushey Heath, Hertfordshire, from running the ads and ordered them to only broadcast unregulated investment ads […]

A few of you have talked about communication on here before, but today I wanted to talk about communication issues and the problems they can cause. I had a landlord friend once who swore blind that the more effective form of communication he had with his tenants was on the phone. He felt it added […]

I was recently asked about buy to rent and having thought about the conversation afterwards I was amazed at how indoctrinated into the jargon of the financial industry I have become. This was to the caller a simple mix of perfectly reasonable English e.g. I want to buy a property and rent it out. Buy […]

The state of the housing markets has led to many property people changing strategy to avoid losing money on sales. Property investors come in two types – buy to let investors and buy to sell traders. Both have a different set of rules to deal with the tax on selling a property. Developer is a […]

Letting agents are urging landlords to make sure they only do business with firms offering a money protection scheme. Firms signed up to the SAFEagent scheme are highlighting that landlords and tenants risk losing thousands of pounds in rents and deposits if an agent outside a money protection scheme shuts. The most recent firm to […]

As the sun begins to show its face, we’re all taking our first tentative steps around the garden and the majority of us will all be thinking the same thing; what a mess! If it makes you feel any better, you should know that we’re all in the same boat and, even though it will […]

“How much can I borrow?” is a question I am asked on a daily basis and thought I would assist by creating a written reference point. The first thing to bear in mind is that Lenders perceive a buy to let mortgage as a self funding commercial business proposition with the rental income covering the […]

This week is SAFEagent awareness week. Property118 has supported SAFEagent since its inception just two years ago. The concept is very simple, a Letting Agent displaying a current SAFEagent badge has purchased client money protection and is also a member of one of the 5 best recognised professional bodies in the UK Letting Industry. What this means […]

The government’s housing benefits policy is in disarray as judges have ruled a crucial test to confirm how big a house a tenant qualifies to rent discriminates against the disabled. The housing benefit regulations, which came into force in April 2012, were criticised as flawed in the Court of Appeal because they do not allow […]

Nearly a third of landlords have plans to buy more rental property this year, according to specialist buy to let lender CHL Mortgages. Landlord confidence is running high with just 1 in 10 aiming to sell property or leave buy to let, with 31% set to expand their portfolios, while the rest continue with business […]

Mortgage Trust will now consider remortgaging a property inside 6 months of the date of purchase, but only if there have been significant improvement works carried out which have enhanced the property’s value.