GENERATION RENT campaigns for professionally managed, secure, decent and affordable private rented homes in sustainable communities.
Join us today and help campaign for a better deal for private renters.
GENERATION RENT campaigns for professionally managed, secure, decent and affordable private rented homes in sustainable communities.
Join us today and help campaign for a better deal for private renters.
The biggest talking point of Jeremy Corbyn's speech to Labour Party conference this week was rent controls. Since 2014 Labour has been proposing to limit rises in rents during tenancies, but there was something different this time around.
This is what the Labour leader said on Wednesday:
Read moreWe will control rents - when the younger generation’s housing costs are three times more than those of their grandparents, that is not sustainable. Rent controls exist in many cities across the world and I want our cities to have those powers too and tenants to have those protections.
The harsh reality of the UK’s sometimes savage housing market is that more people are renting their homes until later in life but paying more for the privilege of doing so than their parents did.
In England the number of private renters has increased from two million to 4.5 million between 1999 and 2015 while renting a home has been eating up a steadily increasing proportion of renters’ income, rising from 8% during the late 1960s to over 27% today, on average. Here we look at the key trends driving up rents across the nation in recent years.
Read moreA few weeks ago, the London Borough of Newham revealed that 13,000 local landlords had failed to declare their rental income, prompting estimates that £200m of tax was being evaded in London alone.
Today, Parliament has published an answer from the Treasury Minister Mel Stride to Frank Field, who asked what assessment the government had made of this. The Minister directed him (and us) to this information on tax gaps (pp54-5).
Read moreThe ban on letting fees is currently the government's flagship policy to help renters, and we're currently waiting for a draft bill to be published, which follows a consultation that we and hundreds of our supporters responded to.
In the meantime, MPs gave us a taste of how the legislation will proceed in Parliament yesterday morning by debating the subject for the first time since last year's Autumn Statement.
Read moreDelayed from August, this week saw the publication of the London Mayor's draft housing strategy, which is now open for consultation for three months.
Covering all housing policy from leasehold reform to tackling street homelessness, the strategy also has a specific section devoted to the private rented sector. With a quarter of London's children in the private rented sector, and millions of renters living in poverty, we all know how urgently action is needed.
We'll be coming back to parts of the strategy in the coming weeks, but here we just focus on the main headlines for renters.
The strategy builds on the Mayor's manifest commitment and previous public statements, and although the Mayor lacks the powers to fundamentally transform London's PRS, there are nonetheless some steps forward and potential to go further.
Read moreIs a new Waitrose in your neighbourhood a cause for excitement, or a troubling omen for your future in the area?
A new study reveals that the high-end supermarket is linked with rising evictions of private tenants in areas they open up in.
The analysis, conducted by Oxford University academic David Adler for Generation Rent, found that the arrival of a new store was associated with an increase in the number of evictions of between 25% and 50%.
Great cheese selection, but will you be around to enjoy it?
Read moreThis week saw the introduction of Karen Buck MP's Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation and Liability for Housing Standards) Bill, a private member's bill which will now have its second reading in parliament on Friday 19 January 2018.
The bill seeks to update the law requiring rented homes to be presented and maintained in a state fit for human habitation - updated because the current law only requires this of homes with a rent of up to £80 per year in London, and £52 elsewhere!
Read moreEvery year the government runs the English Housing Survey. General findings are published in February, then, to the delight of housing geeks, the juicy detail on the different subsections of the market arrives in July. We've taken a look at the findings for 2015-16, published last week.
Read moreBefore today's Queen's Speech, which set out the government's parliamentary programme for the next two years, there were two theories about how housing and private renting might feature, and what kind of prominence it would be given.
Read moreCommissioned in Autumn 2016, the final report of the London Mayor’s investigation into the role of overseas investment in housing was published last week – but its findings can be read in very different ways.
Based on research by the LSE, its major conclusion and argument is that off-plan and pre-sales to the overseas market are integral to the current development model in London – and therefore also key to leveraging more affordable housing through section 106 agreements on those sites.
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can hear everything next door does. neighbours also smoke weed. The landlord (cassandra smith) is extremally rude and arrogant and breaches contacts – informed me a week in advanced that I was to move out for no reason when the contract remained in date – she even tried to increase price of rent after I’d signed the contract. She also made a false claim on my deposit claiming 50 pounds for cleaning of the carpet when they were already clean.The landlord would never visit the property to complete any maintenance, and when maintenance was required she would refuse to do it or even pay for it.
When landlord did visit would leave a mess for you to tidy after her, such as unwashed dishes, hair from her wig and rubbish that she hadn’t put in the bin.
When I first moved in, the landlord had not cleared out the fridges and there was therefore out of date fish and meat that stunk the whole flat out. This was therefore a health and safety hazzard! Landlord had not cleaned the property when I moved in, which I therefore had to do – the majority of this was her hairs they were everywhere!
Word of advice, do not rent off this woman, she is untrustworthy and unhelpful you will be better off renting from a reliable agency.
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