Tenants are willing to pay much more for greener homes!

More than half of tenants would be willing to pay more in rent in order to live in a greener home, new research has revealed.

The survey found that 98% of renters would prefer to live in an energy-efficient home and 52% would be willing to pay an extra 10% in order to do so.

A third of renters (33%) would accept a 5% rent increase, while 8% would be willing to pay an extra 20% if it meant they could rent a greener home.

The vast majority of renters (85%) were happy to consider a so-called “green lease”, which includes clauses designed to ensure the tenant and landlord work together to improve the home’s energy efficiency, while reducing costs and environmental impact.

Very robust market as Landlords dig in!

The buy-to-let sector has taken a bit of a hammering in recent years, what with the stamp duty surcharge and scrapping of tax relief, the latter of which came into effect at the start of the new tax year, April 2017.

However, this doesn't seem to have put off landlords to any extent: experienced landlords still have an average of 13 properties each, with a typical loan-to-value (LTV) of just 35%, so it's clear that buy-to-let could still pay off.

That's according to recent research, which found that the average investment portfolio among experienced residential landlords stood at 13 properties during the first three months of this year.

Specialists buy-to-let brokers are urging buy-to-let landlords to tread with caution and seek appropriate advice before jumping into incorporating their property business into a limited company.

The reduction in mortgage interest tax relief and the introduction of stamp duty are two relatively recent initiatives that have resulted in some landlords reassessing their property businesses and deciding to incorporate.

Lenders are predicting there will continue to be a growing trend towards limited company buy-to-let activity this year. But they warn this may not be the best practice for everybody.

Rates rising?

The fear of rising rates is driving landlords to re-mortgage.

According to the research the number of landlord re-mortgagors fearing a rate rise has increased dramatically over the last 12 months.

There were 17,200 re-mortgages carried out in May & June of which 39% of re-mortgagors surveyed said they anticipated more rate increases within the next year.

By choosing to re-mortgage landlords can reduce monthly repayments, move from a variable rate deal to a fixed rate or even release equity in the property.

With the number of competitive deals on the market growing, many borrowers are choosing to re-mortgage to take advantage of the low rates currently on offer. However, experts are warning that the record low rates we are currently seeing will not last for ever.

Price was by far the most important factor when choosing a lender. More than half (51%) of re-mortgagors said they chose their lender based on low-cost deals, more than twice as many as the second most important factor – customer service (25%).