The report is a comprehensive annual overview of sentiment across the private rented sector, with views from over 1,500 letting agents, landlords and tenants, and will be released in full next week.
Despite last year’s report indicating a softening of sentiment when it came to the scrapping of Section 21, results show that the mood has turned - the number of agents who believe the legislation would have a negative impact on the sector has risen from 56% last year to 70% this year.
So-called ‘no fault’ evictions are set for an immediate ban when the Renter’s Rights Bill - which the government expanded on this week - passes, likely to happen early next year.
Already unpopular amongst landlords and agents, this year’s survey is set to reveal a lack of widespread support amongst tenants for mandating periodic tenancies.
A majority (58.5%) of tenants indicate they would prefer a fixed-term, renewable tenancy agreement, and just a third (30%) favouring a rolling, open-ended agreement.
Only 15% of tenants report feeling "trapped" by a fixed-term tenancy, suggesting the perceived benefits of mandatory periodic tenancies may not align with tenants’ preferences.
The report is also set to reveal that the sentiment across the PRS is worse than it’s ever been – the result of a growing sense of unease and uncertainty about the future of the rental market.
More than half of letting agents - 54% - now feel pessimistic about the PRS, the lowest rate in the history of the report.
The sentiment amongst landlords is even worse, with 75% feeling pessimistic about the PRS, and half of those saying they were “very pessimistic”. Despite the financial pressures many are facing, tenants were the least pessimistic about the sector of all groups.
Goodlord CEO, William Reeve, comments:
“This year’s State of the Lettings Industry report comes at an absolutely critical time. There’s a new Government, a major piece of rental sector reform is soon to hit the statute books, and we are experiencing the most acute housing crisis in a generation. As the initial data shows, this combination of factors is engendering wide-ranging pessimism and concern across the industry, and the imbalance between supply and demand looks set to get worse, not better. ”
Tom Goodlord, Managing Director at Vouch, adds:
“This report is a snapshot of an industry handling a huge amount of change and pressure. As the full survey results will show, the PRS is feeling the weight of this mounting set of challenges. There are opportunities available to address them, but time is of the essence.”
