Quest report BTL survey instructions down by 40% on February

Thanks Gideon Osbourne great job

Wow.
Only a 40% drop
That's mild compared to the drop that will almost definitely occur closer to the nil interest claimable date on BTL loans...2020 is it? not quite sure.
Within a few months Gideon and his pals have decimated this area of business, well done Gideon. Less housing for people who are not in a position to buy, less property sales to draw tax from, less trades, Roofers, Plumbers, Electricians Etc. making a living from fixing up properties, less Solicitors dealings, less mortgages, less Surveyors out working, less materials being sold...Wickes B & Q Homebase Etc Less income for Insurance companies, transport and removal firms.
How can these ill thought out policies possibly help or assist anyone whatsoever?
How can a " a property letting business" go from making a profit to being in a position to be able to calculate the exact day the business will go bankrupt?
Why is the tenant tax not at the top of list of things to do, a policy that is unjust unfair biased and simply does not work in any way shape or form?
What has the government run by Tampon Tax Dodgy Dave ( Well done Dodgy Dave after months and months of tough negotiation with the EU for securing 5% V.A.T to be discounted from Tampon sales after 2019, that said I'm sure users of this product will appreciate it) and Cokehead Gideon done in order to stave off the huge amounts, 300,000 plus people looking for homes to rent and employment turning up every year? I don't mean do not let them in, after all clearly we need doctors, The NHS is a fiasco our hard working doctors nurses and staff are being worked to oblivion, I respect them, their opinions and everything they do, its just that it is being primed for a sell off of services and a switch to an American " if you want healthcare pay more for it with insurance policies", we need teachers, our school systems have been destroyed by this government it has become unstable unpredictable with ridiculous policy being forced on our teaching staff. Turn all schools into government controlled Academy status. Every professional education person when asked about this policy has dismissed it as ridiculous.
Why is choking the life out this area "a letting business" be seen as a solution to the huge shortfall in housing? How can the most ill thought ill conceived malicious assault on "business" be fair or reasonable?
Why has the Tory party isolated every single segment of society? Why is the business minister not doing more to create the environment for jobs? Why is he never available when he is needed most?

Imagine a situation where potentially 1.5 million additional people need housing in the next 5 years 5 x 300,000. Imagine this ...you drive or walk through Birmingham which has a population of only 1.1 million people I believe and every single person you see does NOT HAVE ANYWHERE TO LIVE, DOES NOT HAVE WORK AND ARE DESPERATE !

Imagine that nightmare FOR ONE MOMENT! Because it is a reality it is a possible outcome of the decisions being made by Gideon Cokehead Osborne and his Chums.
How could you possibly have any respect for yourself and your country by looking to impose such preposterous policy that would crush the ability of our population to be able to support a well thought out housing policy by investing in property as a "business" with all the associated risk? How ill conceived is the Tenant Tax.

BTL down by 40 % Well done Gideon. Perhaps demolishing council properties and selling off to developers will solve the issues, shorter tenancy agreements, 2 years have been rumoured, no council homes for people collectively earning more than £31k per year, yeah right Gideon another great idea well done. Empty room Tax another great one, well done Gideon.

Having sold off the ownership of Water, Gas, Trains, Airports and Docks to foreign companies, the next bright idea is to sell off Electricity via investment into nuclear power stations to the Chinese, who must be wetting themselves with laughter, cap in hand Gideon has sold us down the swanny there too, Not only that part of deal is that they also get first dibs on all future power production facilities too. Ha! Figure it out for yourself. Laughing all the way down to their offshore account in the Bahamas/ Cayman islands etc.
Which Gideons family and Dodgy Dave have put to most excellent use as allegedly, Gideons family business has not paid a single penny of tax in 7 years...one can only hope that they see a turn around in profits when some of the policy changes bought into effect by current government come through.
Dodgy Tampon Tax Dave allegedly has family members that arranged their matters in order to not have paid tax for 30 years, well I may be wrong but I bet you £10 that if the cleaning staff at the House of Commons and the House of Lords on minimum wage have had their tax deducted before they received the wages, they have paid into our country and paid good. A cleaning person pays a multimillionaire business person pays nothing.

Food for thought about how things are shaping up on this island.

Well done. Plenty to think about here.

Richard,

I think you'll find because government believes the counters to your arguments.
1. Less housing for people not in position to buy - majority of renter do wish to buy, but prices prevent them. Theory is, if LL are forced to sell then house prices may fall and become more affordable as LL's will only have FTBrs to sell to, and they can't get access to the amount of debt that a LL can.
2. Less property sales to draw tax from - belief is, LL's hold on to their houses much longer than the average owner occupier. When people move, grow a family they often sell and move. If they simply change rented accommodation then no sale has taken place. LL's hold on to houses for very long periods of time.
3. Less work for trades - generally, people who own and live in their own home will spend far more cash on home maintenance / improvements than will a landlord, who tends to do what is needed.

As for the tax being a tenant tax, some people would argue that the amount of vitriol coming from PRS landlords would suggest they know fine and well that these costs can't be passed along to tenant or else they would simply pass them on and carry on as things were.

Just trying to offer the alternative view.

1) possibly in Doncaster,
If you mean house prices fall to the point where Ftbs on the national average wage of 27k can buy a flat in London then take a seat my friend it'll be a long wait. Your not suggesting that the influx of 300,000 people would like to buy their own home are you?
Mortgages for unemployed homeless are difficult to come by.
2) Owning a property for a long period of time allows for stability in a market. It's the "trading" of homes that nudges prices upwards. Hence hot areas of where to buy and where not. Check Zoopla they have maps of hot zones.
Most owners are now forced to stay put and extend a house to cope with a growing family. Reason? It's too expensive to move taxes make the move unrealistic. Why pay huge amounts for an extra box room when the same money gives you a loft conversion.

3) Yes, by private owner or Landlord less sales = less economic activity
Which affects everyone and everything this is not just a Landlord issue it affects everybody.
Cash flow through the UK Ltd system is vital for growth and prosperity. It creates jobs for young people and work for British manufacturers.

4) it will absolutely 100% guaranteed be passed on to the tenant without any shadow of a doubt.
Look, if someone knocked on your door and demanded £600 pounds a week from you for example or you go to jail you will have a few choices.
Pay the money indefinitely if you can afford to, perhaps dispose of assets to find that money ( Question why you should be forced into such a position?)
Give up 5-10-15-20 years of work in building your business ( Why?)
Consider an additional full time job to earn £600 after tax work and hand that over in its entirety your salary.
Look for ways to maximise your rent using whatever guidelines you wish.
Consider that fact that if you do sell there maybe CGT to pay and you may well stop being a nice guy and just charge the absolute max you can.
Absolutely no DSS as you often see in adverts why bother with them?
Top earners in full time employment only.
Now you've maxed up your rent you will keep the property in tip top condition always.
Who is suffering most in this scenario ?

The idea especially up north that FTB will pick up the slack is laughable at best. The areas I operate I have tried to sell In the past with no joy what so ever these policies are aimed at the south

I absolutely agree with NW Landlord.
8m people live in London lets get them to pay for for the 52 m
Not including Scotland and NI
We are talking about a 40% downturn
Let's not even get into or consider Brexit ... Head the hills and keep running as this little grey island spins down the plug hole and disappears ...
I've often thought actually when I've driven around parts of Liverpool Newcastle Lincolnshire bit further down the Midlands my goodness there is literally 1000s of unoccupied homes
I've been to auctions and seen terraced houses starting from £8-10k decent semis for £30-50k
Affordable ? I'd say yes but if you want to live in London in a " hot" area expect to pay more and for there to be fierce competition.

Where I am from u can pick houses up for 30k and rent them for 550 yields are fantastic until that fool started his sabotage. The northern property market especially in lower end areas is grinding down to a halt due to his ill thought out policies.

And to the gentlemen points about Owner occupiers spending more on there houses than landlords I disagree FTB don't buy ran down houses as a rule and like to move into ready made renovated houses

Well tenants do have a limit to what they can pay, and historically rents have tracked income pretty closely for that exact reason. So unless a few indebted LL's are going to buck the trend, I doubt things will change. I charge what I think I can get away with, LL's are not charities, we're in it to make money, let's at least be honest. I think if people thought they could get more rent, they'd already be doing it. Problem is when you raise rents too high you put tenants under excess financial stress resulting in voids which need to be covered by the LL.

As for NW landlords point, if you can get houses for £30k on such good yields, why do you even need mortgages? Why not just sell some stock and reduce the number of houses in your portfolio? I'd rather have 1/4 the houses owned outright personally. To me it just sounds like debt fuelled greed. It's not being a LL that will sink you, it's your debts!

As for raising the rents, I guess we'll just have to see how things pan out then. But have you calculated the % rise in rents you will need by 2020 to fully cover section 24? Give it a go raising them to that level now, let me know how it goes 🙂

And Richard,

As for the go to jail analogy, you have no choice but to pay your debts, you took them on, not the tenant. Don't assume that your tenant will be in the same position- they may have choices you've not considered....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-36285049