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Most corporations that run buy-to-let properties also use the same laws to their advantage, they make their money from the appreciation in property values.
If they want to buy big fuck-off houses to rent out, then fine. But when they buy up the smaller ones (i.e. ones that first time buyers would've been able to afford millennia ago, without rich parents), then they piss me off.
I hate having to fund the parasites, but forty-five grand wouldn't even get me somewhere in Bradford. Renting bollockes any illusion of stability (especially when you rely on housemates), I couldn't give a damn about the "property ladder", but essentially being answerable to someone I'm fucking paying makes me a little (more) bitter.
I don't especially resent my landlord, because this flat would've (if it'd been built then) never been first time buyer material even before silly property prices.
Kermit, it's rich Londoners rather than just southerners. They fuck up the south with their holiday homes as much as anywhere, unfortunately.
Buy to let also causes its fair amount of hardship. The problem is more and more people- I know of two cases- are buying a second home to let as their 'retirement fund'. Not because they want to become landlors or to have a property portfolio, but because they feel that will be the only asset they'll have when they retire.
Unless confidence in the pension system increases more and more people will go down that route I reckon.
buy to let is technically a poor investment at the moment due to low yields, yes youll find tenants, but you wont make any real money on it
I just wish houses were for living in rather than fucking speculation and making more money.
That's all I want one for. Just one, too
A few (lot of) buy-to-let repos would help. Starting with that bint on the BBC.
are you sure about that now?
80% tax on income not profit should do the trick!
And with all that juicy tax income we can give tax breaks to first time buyers in affordable housing.
Landlords don't.
More than once I've been tempted to fuck up the BTL remortgages I deal with.
Neither do I, I happen to be one of them thanks, you can work hard all your life and still end up nowhere, you have to think with your head and work smart......landlords don't work ay, exactly what planet are you living on? You think it's not work to raise the capital, trek across london looking through hundreds of houses to find the right deal that stacks up, then to make an offer before someone else gets there, get a good broker/solicitor in place so the deal doesn't fall through, get a mortgage agreement, get the house, advertise the rooms, get the tenants in..........on top of a full time job? if you think it just falls out of the sky into your lap your raving bonkers.........i'm just glad you're not my solicitor lol.
That must be a lot of scrimping and saving!
And I don't see how buying to let is somehow immoral. Okay if it's preventing people who need a home from buying, then obviously it's not desirable. But let's not forget that their are plenty of people out there who can't buy a house for non-financial reasons. What would you do if you worked all round the country on various contracts, and there were no flats to rent?
In many cases, I don't think they do work for capital. I see so many people remortgage their houses to free up equity that they only have because BTL buyers sent house prices through the roof.
Landlord-hate aside
But a low yield won't always cover the mortgate repayments (and the market, not your mortgage is likely to dictate them).
Houses are ridiculously expensive at the moment. They won't necessarily continue to be. You'd be buggered if they fell considerably.
Although I think Kermit has made some good points, I don't think that being a landlord isn't working.
Think about all the shit you are responsible for, the whole running of the house e.g. plumbing, heating system etc. Also if you get non paying tenants or squatters you are fucked....
The main reason I want to do it is to make a good secure future for my son, what's so wrong with that?
The house price inflation has given more people the capital to buy a second home, and because of that the houses prices go up because everyone can afford to pay the stupid prices. That means most first time buyers are spending 30%-40% of their income on their mortgage, and many tenants are spending 30%-40% of the income on rent. That is bad for everyone, it creates instability and it creates a flawed economy.
There's gonna be a crash, and I hope to God its only BTL owners who get clobbered.
Where I live is favourite for Londoners buying up second homes. Now down the pub you get the local farmers at one end of the bar and the stuck up rich Londoners with their Jags and Range Rovers at the other.
House prices round my way are obscene. The only good thing about that is that my inheritence is going to be pretty good.
I think so.
Even if you've bought at the top of the peak (whenever that is), then as an owner-occupier, you should be able to sit tight and pay the mortgage (even if interest rates rise and you've on a tracker/variable). They'll (house prices) go up again.
You buy as a long term place to live.
If you buy a BTL now, then you stand a pretty good chance of being buggered, as you can't really set an arbitrary rent just to cover the mortgage. If the market rate is less than the mortgage payment, then so be it.
If you've having to subsidise the mortgage payment, and getting no capital appreciation on the rental property, then you're not in a particularly favourable position.
I'm not sure how much of this makes sense when written down, as I've had a few Hoegaardens
BTL has been around for donkey's years, I have family members who have been doing it for 20-30 years and have been very fair landlords since not increasing the rent for 7 years so far !
I don't see how BTL is to blame for the market, the market was screwed anyway, and the goverment should have done a lot more to stabilise it, i.e. raise the interest rates to stop people spending stupid money.
BTL has its place, some people don't want to buy, but the rise and rise of BTL has meant that house prices in popular cities are quite frankly obscene.
I do however concede that BTL is more than likely the reason why the market has KEPT it's value and not burst/dropped before now...
So I guess I can see what you're saying
If you're that concerned why don't you campaign to get the tax laws changed to encourage developers to renovate old homes that lay abandoned.
Where I live the developers are happy to take an old office block and turn them into flats because they can claim back tax breaks but if you want to take an old place that has been empty for years those same breaks don't apply.
As it is in this country the number of people that buy homes rather then rent is much higher then in other countries.
please emphisise the RICH part of that
im a londoner and i hate the housing market as it is at the moment as its pointless to rent at current prices, and a mortgage is well out of my range for next 15 years at current goings
house prices rising more than wages can only result in a big collapse, i believe the IMF recently dubbed the london/uk houseprices 30% overvalued