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Tales from the Front Line

Sarah Daly

As early as it may seem, I have just received the first information for a short letting near to Dorney Lake in preparation for the 2012 Olympics. It has long since been the case that local property owners have rented their houses for large tournaments or events such as Wimbledon but I do not recall, as a local resident myself, events in Windsor and Maidenhead which would encourage inventive short-term Landlords to rent. If my prediction is correct, competition will be fierce to achieve the best rental prices for a short-term letting in the summer of 2012 and agents will be overrun with properties to be considered by potential Tenants and possibly competitors. The race is on.....

Sarah Daly

From time to time in the rentals industry we see different conditions which favour either Landlords or Tenants. However, having been in the business nearly 20 years, I don't ever recall a market like this. In the Country particularly we are experiencing such a severe lack of rental stock that all good properties are receiving two or more bids to let and competition to secure the right house is fierce. With the scarcity factor now being a key component to the bidding process, we have recently been invited on all of our higher value transactions to submit "best and final” bids....... Where has this come from? This is not rental terminology and yet, time after time, we are finding this bull-market mechanism being used in the lettings market and a common theme has been that some agents have been a little behind the curve in their valuations and have not taken into account the simple economics of supply and demand.

Watch this space to see if rental values increase significantly should stock levels not improve - it's definitely a Landlord's market.

Sarah Daly

Talking to agents every day, we get a very good understanding on their take of markets and factors which affect them. Speaking with some key contacts this week, the current word on the street is that "the wretched budget" set for today is affecting everything in our rentals world. The biggest issue is that many owners are not making decisions on renting or selling until they have a better handle on their CGT position. The consensus is that if the Government does raise CGT levels without taper relief there is going to be "an unholy amount of chaos" as people try and secure sales on their properties. However, if there is a longer taper relief on the introduction to any changes in CGT, there will be some owners who retain their assets and rent them whilst waiting to see how the world changes.

In the meantime, we watch and wait. One agent I spoke to commented that, getting owners to agree to rent for longer periods, in conjunction with investment Landlords experiencing difficulties with lending, means that the whole market is "frozen in terror".

I don't think things have quite reached terrifying levels yet but I will be very happy to see the bubble burst on 22 June as we have a better understanding on what happens next.

Sarah Daly

The big story of the week for me is that we have been guzumped twice by asking price offers from corporate tenants. Yes, that’s right company lets are back and they mean business – asking price offer only, please!


 
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