Welcome to our Christmas Newsletter 2022
The Landlord Broadband team hopes you enjoy our Christmas newsletter, 2022 edition! Read on to find out more about recent industry news and customer markets. If you would like to read our previous newsletter from the last quarter, click here.
Top 5 Christmas Movies!
It’s nearly Christmas!
We made a video showing our top 5 Christmas movies for you to watch or rewatch this year!
Industry News
Regulation
An Energy Price Guarantee was put in place to hopefully help households in Great Britain save £700 this winter. Accompanied by a review period when the guarantee expires to consider further ways to assist British homeowners. The Energy Price Guarantee has also been launched by the UK Government. This is to help households in Northern Ireland during this difficult time. This guarantee ensures that until March 2023, households in Northern Ireland will have reduced energy bills. This is in addition to the £400 discount already being offered to cover fluctuating energy prices and the £1,200 to help support the most vulnerable. (Gov.UK).
Scotland introduced a Cost of Living Bill to parliament, offering various housing statistics and explaining that there are certain socio-economic patterns in the data – for example, “rented households are more likely to be in fuel poverty”. Said statistics’ are justifications for the coming bill which aims to alleviate the burden of the cost of living crisis. (Gov.Scot).
Finance
When landlords remortgage this year, their profits are estimated to be £7 a year per property. It has been warned Landlords must:
- Raise rents dramatically;
- Invest tens of thousands of pounds in their properties,
Or sell their properties as huge rate increases destroy the viability of buy-to-let portfolios. Studies have shown 5 out of 11 regions in Britain, properties will become loss making with London landlords being hit the worst. Buy-to-let is now being labelled as ‘unsustainable’ with Lodestone mortgage brokers, Craig Fish stating investors with a small number of properties are selling up due to it no longer being financially viable or cost-effective. Fish goes on to say “after deducting agents’ fees and other costs, they are going to be left with very little profit” (Telegraph).
The Autumn statement in parliament Jeremy Hunt states the UK is now in recession (Independent) and announces social housing tenants in England will be subject to a 7% rise in their rents next year. Within the social housing sector there are 4 million people meaning rents are expected to rise by 1% above the consumer price index in the coming financial year. This amounts to an 11.1 percent increase given that inflation reached 10.1 percent in September.
The head of the Chartered Institute of Housing, Gavin Smart, was in support of this 7% increase. He sympathises with the situation stating it was “a really difficult balancing act” continuing to state “we know that this will not be easy for tenants given the impact it will have on affordability. But without sufficient income, landlords will not be able to maintain homes and services that tenants have every right to expect” (FT).
Technology
The National Association of REALTORS Research Group released their 2022 Home Buyers and Sellers Generational Trends Report. Reports revealed that a whopping 95% of homebuyers across age demographics used the internet during their search. Furthermore, half then went on to purchase online. Though this is somewhat unsurprising during the digital age, these statistics simply highlight the integral role that technology plays in each process and aspect of the housing industry. From browsing potential homes to using the internet in the comfort of your own property, to homebuyers Wi-Fi connection is crucial, and moreover expected.
Customer Markets
Landlords
This quarter is going to be a tough one for landlords. The UK Collaborative Centre for Housing Evidence’s surveying 1,000 landlords finding one in five full-time landlords were planning on quitting due to costs of living rising (LandlordZone). Handelsbanken Property Survey report showed similar findings. The report found one third of landlords are looking to make their portfolios more energy-efficient to in turn lower bills and landlords with four-five properties are twice as likely to start making their properties energy efficient. There is increasing uncertainty for landlords leading to over a third cutting back on buying properties in cities and 45% saying they have plans on buying lower-value properties in order to be under the Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) threshold in another attempt to combat rising costs.
The demand for student housing for 2023–2024 has increased dramatically from the previous year! According to a UniHomes statistic, the north of England’s cities are the most competitive, showing a 79% rise. The most popular locations are Newcastle, Leeds, and Sheffield. The director of UniHomes, Phil Greaves, commented pointing out that there are two dominant drivers for the increase in student accommodation. Firstly, a surge in students wanting a full university experience after covid-19. Secondly, wanting to find the best affordable property in the cost-of-living crisis. Greaves stated, “more students (are) ‘shopping around’ for the most affordable homes” and instead of staying in the same university accommodation each year it is “more likely people will move around to find more affordable rents” (Landlord Today). This upcoming academic year, will surely be difficult for students to find adequate housing, which is a factor landlords need to take into account.
Build to Rent
Godwin Developments have launched a thrilling new project within the build-to-rent (BTR) sector this quarter. The Birmingham property developer announced a nationwide £1 billion BTR project with an unnamed investor, which will target both single-family and multifamily BTR sectors. The houses will be throughout areas in Birmingham, London, and Bristol. Godwin Developments’ director and co-founder, Stephen Pratt, stated “This launch is truly transformational for our business” and that they’re “thrilled to announce the next step in (their) growth ambitions in the BTR sector”.
For families, sharers, and couples, it has been discovered that BTR is a less expensive option than conventional lets! In 2012, after the London Olympics, BTR first came to prominence in the UK. They were made to provide high-quality and well-managed apartments targeting renters (Property Investor Today). Nowadays, the BTR market has expanded and has shown to be advantageous for individuals who live in couples or in groups. Due to them being less expensive than private landlords, who many people once believed to be the reverse! In the ‘Who Lives in Build-to-Rent?’ report by the British Property Federation, Dataloft, BusinessLDN, and the UK Apartment Association discovered families in the urban private rented sector pay 32% of their income compared to families in urban BTR homes paying 5% less, being 27% of their income (Landlord Zone).
PBSA
Exciting news for the PBSA sector this quarter! A new PBSA partnership has been resubmitted for Corvette Capital and Crown Student Living to deliver four student developments across the UK worth approximately £400m. A revised scheme in the centre of Birmingham could see a 33-storey skyscraper being built. The new plan calls for a 100m-high development with 7 floors more than the previous plans. This development is a mixture of studio, cluster and duplex flats. Which all have a lounge, gym, games room, cinema, and study rooms on the ground floor (The Business Desk).
The global PBSA industry is estimated to rise significantly over the next few years (alpenhornnews). The size of the market in 2021 was USD 39 million and recently was predicted to significantly increase. In the Global PBSA Market Research Report 2022, to reach USD 79 million by 2028! The key players in the Global PBSA market have been revealed as Showa Denko, PTTMCC, Kingfa and Sinopec (Market Study Report).
Serviced Accommodation
The Welsh Government has a new scheme that would require owners to acquire planning permission to classify a property as a second home from a primary residence. (Gov.Wales). This is reminiscent of the Scottish Government who proposed the same legislation in 2021 in order to tackle the second home/short-term let crisis. Edinburgh is now a control area where short term lets need planning permission. Whether or not this measure will be effective in tackling the oversaturation of short term lets is yet to be seen. The Scottish Government aims to release new guidance on the matter by 2023, and the impact of control areas will likely impact the guidance and measures moving forward. (Scottish Housing News).
In England, the second home crisis seems to have taken a back seat. The ongoing energy and cost of living crisis takes priority, which will be discussed in the ‘Legal’ section, and with the drive to protect vulnerable people during the incipient winter, discussed in the section below.
Social Housing
Regarding social housing, Fiona MacGregor, the Regulator of Social Housing has detracted her previous statement that she will step down. MacGregor will continue on as the Chief Executive. Under MacGregor’s leadership, the Regulator of Social Housing has conducted their first round of annual stability checks. This is with registered social housing providers of more than 1,000 properties complying. It is comforting to know that during this housing, energy and cost of living crisis, registered social housing providers are working with the government to “carry out safety, decarbonisation and repair works” (Gov.UK).
The Kerslake Commission on Homelessness and Rough Sleeping released their Progress Report for 2022. In said report, the Kerslake Commission suggests that the eviction ban is necessary during the cost-of-living crisis to prevent increased homelessness and evictions. (Kerslake Commission). This is especially critical during the winter months, where people displaced by COVID-19, the housing crisis and energy crisis are especially at risk.
Wales has updated its consultation on “post pandemic interim homelessness measures”. 77% of respondents agreed with adding ‘person sleeping rough’ to the priority need category. They also expressed concern about abuse of the system and a strain on resources and staff. How the government will quell these issues is unknown. They’re likely to move forward with this 11th category, and possibly add another for persons sleeping rough under 35. In addition, debates were put forward as to who qualifies as a person sleeping rough. Which could drastically impact who receives the intended support and how. Whether or not these measures will be sufficient is a question for the future. (Gov.Wales).
NRLA Landlord Conference
As announced, in the previous newsletter, we attended the Landlord Conference in November! We thoroughly enjoyed being apart of such a brilliant event and would like to share some photos from our day.
Case Studies
3 Rented Flats
In this new case study we were challenged to provide a sufficient managed Wi-Fi solution for 6 end users. This was over 3 floors in 3 rented flats.
Watch to find out how we overcame this problem!
12 Bed Build-To-Rent
In this video, we explore :
- What was needed for the property;
- The issues when installing the broadband;
- How we fixed them.
We also look at the installation’s initial and second fixes, as well as the final outcome!
We hope you enjoyed the 2022 Autumn Newsletter, hope to see you again reading our next edition…
If you would like to know how Landlord Broadband can help you:
- Email us at customer.services@landlordbroadband.com;
- Call 0333 577 0600;
- Fill out our free assessment form.