We recently blogged on the findings of RICS latest statistics showing that rental prices had been falling and would continue to do so, and that there was a lack of homes to rent.

We have backed this up in conducting survey’s with local agent’s across Basingstoke, Southampton and Portsmouth. There is very little difference upon town variants, but according to RICS it is more a regional difference, with London in particular being hit.

Rentright.co.uk have had feedback that rental prices have fallen by 10% in recent months. What is worrying is that they also report having void periods, which is something that hasn’t been typical of the past. Rather than accept a lower rent quite a few Landlords have been holding out for a higher price, which has resulted in voids of some 2/3 months. When will they realise that accepting a lower rent is not as bad as having a property stand empty for a couple of months?

Agents are reporting lower offers being made due to the supply and are working hard to convince the Landlords to accept.  Agents also report that there is a shortage of family homes to rent in the more central locations and an over supply of flats, which falls in line with the RICS report. The main problem has been that there has been a massive amount of unsold properties hitting the lettings market since January 2009.

The figures heighten concerns about the fragile buy-to-let market, where repossessions are double that of the residential market.  Will things improve in the coming months?

Feedback has not been too positive, with many thinking it is going to be some time before we come out of this dark time.  To compare rental prices in your area look to Residential Rental Price Index produced by Rentright.co.uk in the RRPI, which is updated every time property comes onto the web.

It has been hard over the last couple of years and there are no markets that have not suffered in some form.  The rental property market has faired remarkably well compared to many other industry sectors and although there has been a decline in growth for both demand for rental properties and new landlord instructions in the first quarter of 2009 there is an optimistic outlook.

There are some statistics that have been made public by the Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) which reported that 55% of surveyors reported falls in rent in the first part of this year.  However, there was also reports of a 16% rise in the number of tenants searching for a rental property during the same period.  The study conducted by RICS also suggested that the outlook was for rents to continue to decline other the coming months.

The good news for the letting agents and the landlords is the demand for the rental property has been on the increase and the types of property that are most in demand are houses compared to flats.  This then brought a faster decline in rent prices for flats than for houses due to the supply and demand factors.  The demand for property and the fall in rental prices is very much a regional effect and the worst hit area of England and Wales was London which saw the worst in the rent prices and the tenant demand than anywhere else in the country.

Rentright is a UK wide rental property portal and has the unique RRPI (Residential Rental Price Index) which can be used as a guide line to show the current prices and trends in the area you are looking to rent a property.  The rental statistics are updated in real time and can be broken down into the number of bedrooms and the type of property required.  Also you can find current rental property advertised by local letting agents and landlords in the UK on the Rentright website.

You have more than likely noticed the speed increase in the rentright website, this is due to a new dedicated server platform.

Never mind the market showing signs of Green Roots and recovery in the property sales sector, what happened to this proposed Green paper? We at rentright.co.uk recently reported that The Government was to produce a green paper regards legislation of Private Landlords.

Well where is it?

We in the Industry know the importance of dealing with legitimate businesses and would welcome the change in practise so that this newly proposed system could “weed out” the unscrupulous Landlords. Maybe the Government has been too busy “weeding out” a little closer to home, given the non-stop news regards all the MP’s expense claims. (And don’t get me started on that)

Well now that we seem to have got that out of the way (or have we?) and various ministers have resigned, perhaps we could get back to the business of running our house efficiently and get on with the job we are supposed to be doing – which is delivering what we said we would!

Seriously though, this is something that is long over due, and given that ARLA have tightened their belt to tackle problem Landlords, we await with bated breath the overdue paper. Also on a more positive note, the extra revenue The Government raises could go some way to paying back the vast sums of money some MP’s have claimed on renting second homes and other incidentals.

For letting your property, look no further than Rentright Property Portal and any MP looking for a second home, visit rentright.co.uk for all Rental Property throughout the UK.

With a reported 21% of agents not knowing where their website traffic is coming from, it is important for Rentright to provide full details to its member agents to show just how usefull the site is.

Research has come out that indicates the Buy to Let landlords are suffering hard with the credit crunch. In terms of repossession indications show that over 3 times as many investors are losing their properties than normal home owners. Research also indicated by the council of Mortgage lenders that there were 1700 buy to let properties that were repossessed in the first three months of 2009. (source bbc.co.uk)

There are obvious problems for the tenant when a landlord has the home repossessed and it can be a very worrying time. However there is good news if you find yourself in this position as there is a process called receiver of rent. This is where the tenant can remain in their home and they pay their rent to the bank or the repossession company. There are two good points to this, firstly if you are the tenant this gives you some time to find a new property to live in, this is especially the case where the lender is likely to sell on the property. Secondly, the lender can buy themselves more time to decide how they want to proceed with the property in terms of sales process.

This problem has arisen where the landlords were paying too much for their buy to let properties, and having problems covering the rent either by not being able to find tenants for the property or a short fall in the rent. When this is the case it is very easy to fall in arrears with the mortgage and never be able to recover. If you are a tenant or a landlord and are looking for property to rent or advertising then you need to ensure you use services such as Rentright a UK wide Rental Property Advertising site. If you are renting via a letting agent then make sure the agent is using services such as Rentright to gain maximum exposure for your property.

Rental property without tenants in will be losing money.