Councillors have asked for a report into private rents in Brighton and Hove in the hope that they will be granted the power to enforce rent controls.
London mayor Sadiq Khan and Bristol mayor Marvin Rees have called on the government to give them the power to intervene in the rental market.
The request in Brighton and Hove came from Labour councillor Tobias Sheard and fellow councillors backed his request for a report to assess rental costs and the potential effects of rent controls.
One even described agents encouraging prospective tenants to “gazump” each other by putting in an offer to pay more than the advertised rent to improve the chances of being offered a tenancy.
The report on rent controls would also look at a long-term strategy to improve conditions for renters in Brighton and Hove.
Councillor Sheard spoke about searching for a flat with three friends last month at a meeting of Brighton and Hove City Council’s Housing and New Homes Committee meeting yesterday (Wednesday 20 September).
He said that one of the flats that he looked at was “claustrophobic”. It had three bedrooms with small rooms but no garden or balcony and the price was £1,820 a month.
Councillor Sheard, who is originally from the Isle of Wight, spoke to family friends who said that they were paying £1,200 for a three-bedroom house with a garden and private driveway.
He said: “According to Zoopla’s rental prices index, not only does Brighton and Hove currently have the highest rent prices outside of Greater London but we also have rent prices so high that six separate London boroughs have lower average rent prices, some coming in £250 a month lower than Brighton.
“The only difference between us and Hillingdon is that if you work in Hillingdon, you are granted the London wage uplift to help pay those higher costs.”
Councillor Sheard criticised the amount of new housing being built by private companies that ended up as “nothing more than a form of investment”.
Labour councillor Bruno De Oliveira said that the high cost of housing was a “burden on our wellbeing, mental and physical health”.
Fellow Labour councillor Faiza Baghoth said that the cost was putting off doctors from coming to Brighton and Hove. She said that the issue came up in a Heathwatch meeting.
Surgeries in Brighton and Hove have complained in the past about the difficulties faced when trying to recruit family doctors – and Brighton and Hove has a below-average number of GPs (general practitioners).
Green councillor Ellen McLeay said that she would like to see rent controls and suggested investigating different rent control models in European cities to establish which would improve affordability.
Labour councillor Gill Williams, who chairs the committee, agreed.
Conservative councillor Anne Meadows was against the motion, saying that landlords also faced increasing costs to improve standards and pressure on mortgage payments.
She said: “Instead of 10 people going for a property, there will be 25 to 30. I’m just not sure that’s what you’re going for.
“At the moment, it’s supply and demand. If there is a demand on the supply available, that is what is pushing up prices.”
Labour councillor Andrei Czolak said that the situation described by Councillor Meadows was already happening. When he tried to move last month, there were 15 to 20 people at the various viewings.
Councillor Czolak said that the properties were not of the quality that he expected for the budget set by him and his partner who were earning “an above average” income.
Councillor Czolak said: “The real outrage I felt has come about recently. You view a property. Before you leave, you have a letting agent say to you, you can put your offer in—an offer on rent.
“It is on the market for X amount. That should be what it goes for.”
Councillors are in the position to demand affordable housing in new developments through their planning committees. Why, for example, was the York and Elder complex built as solely rental accommodation, starting at £1600pm for a one-bed?
While there has been some good work in developing bespoke student accommodation to free up private housing, there is still a long way to go in reducing the number of HMOs, Air BnBs, and in the council refusing planning applications that do not include more affordable housing.
“Affordable” doesn’t mean anything if you let anyone buy the properties, either. Require that real people buy and own the homes: investors can go elsewhere.
In Canada Justin Trudeau brought in a new law prohibiting house purchase from abroad unless it was to be lived in by the purchaser.
Only one part of the UK has rent caps currently. Scotland. And guess what part of the UK has the highest increase in new rental prices? Yes, Scotland.
Rent controls will mean landlords sell up. Great if you are a rich renter and can buy. But for most renters that means less choice and higher prices
The only way out of this is more homes. Build more, especially social housing. The council is doing this but just a few hundred a year. Basically at the level of population growth.
Rent control calls are a distraction by councillors, especially as they don’t have the power to do it anyway. There is an answer which is in their control. Build far more social housing. And fast!
I suggest you look at the geography of Brighton and Hove to better understand why they can’t just build much more social housing here, as well as who owns the land. The council would also need the finances to do it. Central government is largely in control of whether more social housing gets built. If nothing else rent controls would send out a message that ripping off renters is wrong. No one should be making profits off of the back of someone else’s need for a home.
Sounds like we need a change in government to one that cares about social housing. It relieves so many pressures.
f Inobody can make a profit from renting homes, there will be no homes for rent. We would need a huge programme to build many thousands of social homes, whch isn’t going to happen. It’s all very well wanting private landlords out, but there is no alternative. We need to find a system which is fair for tenants, but also fair for landlords.
Sorry for typo. Should be ‘if nobody’
Landlords are the problem. We shouldn’t be pandering to their wants. They’ve held all the cards too long and it’s time to redress the balance
No, poor housing strategy for decades is the problem.
You need to understand that if landlords are forced out of the market there is little alternative accommodation available in the social sector, and there’s not going to be mass social house building any time soon, if ever. Yes, it’s certainly desirable to increase standards but you don’t lower rent by deliberately forcing landlords out. That has the compete opposite effect. Nobody has to be a landlord – if capital is better deployed elsewhere then landlords leave. Could be helpful for those with a large deposit and able to get a mortgage who could buy their property, but disasterous for those who can’t.
Without private LL providing accommodation services millions of people would be homeless.
This is already happening.
You haven’t really thought this through have you!?
There are several alternatives. CLTs, RSS, and to elect a government that has a housing strategy, to name a few.
I’m not familiar with those acronyms. I gather CLT is a Community Land Trust? I’ve just looked through London CLT’s website, so not familiar with these trusts but sounds something of a niche pursuit that requires gifted land or community-raised funds. Doesn’t sound scalable in any meaningful way. RSS I couldn’t put my finger on.
Regarding government housing strategy, neither the Tories or Labour have one. We’re all familiar with Tory housing policy (or lack thereof), but the only Labour policy I have heard is some soundbites about ‘being the party of builders’ or similar nonsense. I suspect when Labour attempt to put meat on the bones, it will be another policy of their that doesn’t survive contact with reality and it quietly rowed back.
Of course PROFIT should be made on providing accommodation services.
You want free food do you!?
Who’s gonna pay for that then!?
Me!?
You can go take a running jump I’m not paying for your free food nor accommodation.
You pay market prices.
You are competing in an accommodation market.
You have no right to any accommodation.
It is simply IMPOSSIBLE to build sufficient housing of all types to meet demand
Forget existing demand every 2 years 1.2 million immigrants both legal and illegal are added to the UK population.
Only closing the borders for about 20 years will give a chance for sufficient housing to be built to neet current demand.
This will never happen so rents will increase and rental stock will substantially reduce due to Govt anti-LL policies.
Rent Controls would just cause more LL to sell up.
Rent Controls would be evaded.
Brown envelopes would be required or no tenancy!!
There are no “illegal” immigrants. By definition, if anyone is in the country illegally they are arrested and deported. Regardless of the irregularity of entry, or the status under which they remain, all immigrants in the U.K. are here legally.
Seek rent control by adding an annual fee to the landlords costs. I wonder who will end up paying that ?
At a time of record high rents and a shrinking rental stock. This smacks more of revenue generation to me.
Between high interest rates, end of no fault evictions, changes to tax allowances and energy upgrade costs the average landlord is being squeezed out.
Once all that is left are large rental corporations that have monopoly guess what then happens..
Rent controls are one step away from communism and landlords are an easy target. I don’t see the government telling the oil and petrol companies what they can charge for fuel or the supermarkets what they can charge for food. As a small time landlord (not a fat, capitalist pig), I have chosen to invest in property. I have just a couple of rental properties that I hoped were for the long term. Both have big mortgages. I have taken the risk that property prices could fall, my mortgage costs could go up, I could get big maintenance bills and I could get a bad tenant who decides to stop paying the rent or trashes MY property. Nevertheless, my actions have provided housing for people who either choose to rent or cannot afford to buy. Rent prices are determined by supply and demand, so if there was sufficient housing, my incoming rent would fall. This is just one more risk for me. Landlords are already hit very hard by the government by taxes and increasing regulation and are selling up in droves. If they tell me what I can charge for rent when I have no control over my costs, I will be one more landlord having to evict my tenants and sell. Of course, these properties will get bought and lived in by someone, but the government’s actions will have put me out of business, reduced their income from taxation and made the tenants homeless. Not great logic. Surely better to build more homes and stop meddling in the private rental sector where the ultimate victim is the tenant?
Price caps exist for fuel and energy, Adrian. That is a terrible example. And by no means are you doing anyone a favour, since that would mean there is more supply. You not buying to let would improve the supply, reducing rents.
Rent prices are whatever you want to set it as, they aren’t set by supply and demand. CLTs are an excellent example of this. Unfortunately, your righteous indignation is logically unsound.
And do you who else can buy your property when you sell, the council, to make social housing.
I’m sorry Adrian, but you will not be missed.
Spot on
Of course they are set by supply & demand, if there’s no demand for the property at the asking rent you set then you have no option but to reduce the rent.
You don’t have to charge the highest rent you can get away with though, do you? The only thing you are supplying against is the demand is on your profit margins.
In the case of energy caps, the government tops up the payment to the energy supplier, so does not dictate what the supplier receives. There is no such top up proposed for landlords. So if landlord costs exceed what the tenant pays in rent, sadly the tenant has to go. Landlords are not charities and are only landlords by choice. Those who wish all landlords gone may soon get what they wish for. That does beg the question of where all the tenants are going to live.
Landlords may go, Adrian, but they’re not tearing down the houses. Do you think that if landlords sold up, all the properties would suddenly disappear?
Why should the tenant care a jot what the landlord’s costs are, or be expected to pay a rent increase to cover those costs? If the landlord cannot afford to run a property as a business and accept risks and losses, they should not be in that business in the first place.
Oh dear, another one who just doesn’t get it. Nobody is going to provifde housing or any other type of product or service at a loss. If a business can’t generate enough cash to cover their costs they close it down. Very basic economics John.
Do you think that if landlords sell up, tenants will be able to buy all their properties? Every tenant has tens of thousands for a deposit and could get a mortgage, but can’t because ‘landlords’? There’s hundreds of flats on the market in Brighton and Hove. Why aren’t tenants buyng these John? Have a think on that and explain why driving landlords out of the market is good for tenants.
If your letting business is unviable Nige, then close it down.
Unfortunately, that’s not what we’re seeing. We’re seeing unviable landlord businesses pushing their losses onto a captive market, on the one hand claiming to be altruistic and “providing accommodation” yet on the other hand pushing all cost increases onto the tenant.
Nobody’s suggesting that tenants can afford (or want) to buy, that’s a fiction in your head. All tenants want is a fair price for fair housing regardless of who provides it.
Unless you built the properties, you haven’t “provided” any housing at all. The houses were there before you, and will still be there long after you’re gone.
Strange that your notion of “communism” is used in the most capitalistic city of the past 100 years…New York.
This mindset only betrays the fact that you are not the type of person we want investing in property in the uk. Do us all a favour and sell your “investment” properties asap.
Maybe all the landlords complaining about this could consider getting a job?
Yeah, jobless people are well known for being able to buy property
They are, although they tend to call themselves “retirees.”
Whether your landlord is retired or still working is irrelevant. If there isn’t enough profit or possibly no profit on heavily mortgaged properties, then the landlord will sell. The only real loser is the tenant, especially if they can only afford to rent. The ever decreasing number of properties available to rent can only result in increased rents. I feel sorry for my tenants, some have chosen to rent from me for around 20 years, but as all landlords are now seen as lazy, fat cat baddies, I have had enough. With savings accounts now paying over 6 percent interest, I am choosing the no hassle option as I no longer want to be a baddie landlord. That will ultimately result in all my tenants looking for new accommodation and therefore pushing up prices. Only solution is to build more homes.
If properties are heavily mortgaged and the landlord cannot afford to run the properties without gouging the tenants, then the landlord is simply bad at business.
Prices are being pushed up by bad business owners pretending to be landlords, who see tenants as the easy way out for their bad decisions.
Depends on their portfolio, it reaches a critical mass.
Why when being a LL is a job!?
Most LL have other jobs as well as being a LL doesn’t pay enough.
Consider 95% of LL only have 2 letting properties.
Average net income about £800
DONT believe anyone can survive on that.
Welfare scroungers earn more than that.
There is no virtue in having a PAYE job.
Perhaps self-employment is preferred
Being a LL is a perfectly legitimate method to make money but you need more than 2 letting properties to achieve that.
Being mortgage free might bring in sufficient rental income to not have to work.
But highly unlikely.
Yep if you are in receipt of UC and you have assets worth more than £16000 the DWP stops your UC.
So how are you supposed to save a deposit!!!??
Councils getting involved in privately owned businesses is a recipe for disaster, they struggle to run their own services.
Completely irrelevant comparison, with no substance, nor insightful. Will you be selling up?
Ridiculous statement made without evidence. Please sell your properties and do us all a favour
Councillors and MPs need to look at what’s driving up rents. Houses and flats being turned into Airbnb lets depriving the private rental market of housing stock. Only this week another family house in Hanover has been lost to the holiday let market. Please can our politicians please consider restrictions on Airbnbs in designated residential areas of Brighton and Hove?
You’ll be pleased to know that our current council has been working on primary tenancies clauses on new builds.
Have you given any thought or consideration as to what might be driving LL to change their long-term letting business model to something else!?
Ever heard of S24!?
If you haven’t it is a tax device introduced in 2016 that taxes mortgaged sole trader LL on turnover.
A LL can be in a position where no rent profit occurs but still fictitious income is required to pay tax on fictitious income!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
None of this occurs with AirBnB and FHL.
With IR having massively increased S24 has an even worse effect on long-term letting finances.
Abolish S24 and you would find LL return to long-term lettings.
Most LL would much prefer to carry on with long-term letting.
Govt has made it unviable.
I suppose maybe a realistic question is does everyone need to live in Brighton. Personally, I would like to like in Holland Park in a nice house but I can’t afford it. There are many cheaper places to live.
What you mean residing where you can afford!!!!!!!!!???
Bit of a revolutionary concept!!
DONT you know the millenia are ENTITLED to reside where they want.
They DONT consider affordability should affect them.
It’s only those nasty market realities which impinge on their fantasy lifestyles.
Oh! it’s a wicked world!
If I move to a place in the UK I can afford to buy, Paul, then I lose my job which would pay for it. There’s nowhere on the scale where the housing prices meet the needs of first time buyers, because everywhere you go you’re competing with people from that area who already have property and are investing in more property.
I did think the answer would be WFH, as then I could do my job from a less pricey area. Despite my team massively increasing our productivity and streamlining our processes over those pandemic years, the managers insist we call come back because… Well there’s no plausible business reason for it.
Millennials like me (i.e. people in their thirties) do have some legitimate problems to face.
Indeed, you can get a much better bang for your buck as it where by moving further afield. I was looking at Sheffield properties in comparison, and we’re comparing studios vs 3-4 bedroom properties.