All posts by Ruban Selvanayagam

What Does Universal Credit Mean for Landlords?

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Launched in 2013, Universal Credit’s underlying aim was to simplify the welfare system by merging six of the main social security benefits into one.  Monthly Local Housing Allowance (or housing benefit) payments will now be pooled into a single sum alongside Income Support, income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance, income-related Employment Support Allowance, Working Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit. By the end of 2017, the roll-out is to be “accelerated” into a further 150 new areas [1].  With the number of claimant households expected to grow from 570,000 today to 8 million in 2022, the implications for landlords who house LHA tenants are noteworthy (see the Department of Work & Pensions landlord’s guide here). A Disaster Waiting to Happen? Part of the former coalition government’s drive to “make work pay”, i.e. rewarding people for transitioning into gainful employment, the initial phasing of Universal... [Read More]

Buy-to-Let Property Investor´s Financial Calculator

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Buy to Let Financial Calculator

Particularly given the changing economics of the buy-to-let sector, and what we feel is the need to adopt a judicious approach to the relative merits of a given deal, the financial calculator has been developed to facilitate a more detailed analysis.  Please click here or fill your details in the short “JOIN OUR E-MAIL LIST” form to receive the file (as well as the accompanying notes and our professional property investor’s e-book). Built in Microsoft Excel, the calculator has been split into 7 sections: Headline Figures: provide users with a cursory glance (using data extracted from the following section).  Note that this particular spreadsheet caters only to single-let residential property analysis (not Houses of Multiple Occupation, multiple units, developments, refurbishments etc.); Detailed Figures / Information: a breakdown of 46 fundamental metrics and essential data sources based on inputting a handful of... [Read More]

Buy-to-Let Property Investor´s eBook

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The first edition of the PS Investor Services eBook has been compiled in a buy-to-let operational environment where, particularly in recent years, recurring fiscal and regulatory intervention has seemingly become customary. The 28,000+ word digital document aims to dissect the principal issues of concern in the coming years and will be of interest to investor-landlords who embrace a longer term and professional outlook to property wealth accumulation. Readers will also find hints, tips and and a wide range of up-to-date resources relevant to the buy-to-let industry’s fast-changing operational environment. Please click here or fill your details in our contact box to receive the e-book (as well as our financial calculator and accompanying notes). The easily accessible PDF has been split into 10 chapters, broadly outlined below: Formally introduced in January 2017, the core aim of the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) revised affordability... [Read More]

Commentary on the September 2017 Property Investor´s Factfile

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September 2017 Property Investor´s Factfile The Property Investor Blog´s monthly factfile presents a range of relevant data from national / London house prices, the latest buy-to-let Limited Company (SPV) loan rates, LIBOR / SWAP rates and rentals to mortgage debt figures and information on the first-time buyer sector.  Some noteworthy observations from the last month are outlined below: According to the latest Rightmove house price index, UK house prices fell 0.9% month-on-month in August but remained up 3.1% on the year. Rightmove director and housing market analyst Miles Shipside commented: “A combination of traditional summertime price blues and the chill of uncertainty in the air has cooled price growth in some parts of the country.  Affordability also remains very stretched. But despite these factors, high demand and limited supply are still driving momentum, especially in the counties in the middle of the country;” The... [Read More]

Making the Private Rented Sector Work for People in Poverty

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The following write up is from a summer 2017 event held by social policy research and development charity the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) – principally exploring how the private rented sector can work better for lower income groups and those in poverty.  Timely in nature in terms of its proximity to the Grenfell Tower disaster, Campbell Robb, chief executive of the organisation, started the event by reasoning how the social / affordable housing crisis continues to elicit opinions from all sides.  However, the broad consensus remains that both policy making and market dynamics are not keeping up with the changes necessary to improve the current landscape. After some real-life quotes from tenants across the country, Robb went on to describe the Private Rented Sector (PRS) as the “home of poverty” – with current estimations pointing to 4.7 million people living in poor... [Read More]

Commentary on the August 2017 Property Investor´s Factfile

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August 2017 Property Investor´s Factfile The Property Investor Blog´s monthly factfile presents a range of relevant data from national / London house prices, the latest buy-to-let Limited Company (SPV) loan rates, LIBOR / SWAP rates and rentals to mortgage debt figures and information on the first-time buyer sector.  Some noteworthy observations from the last month are outlined below: Both the Halifax and LSL / Acadata house price indices reported drops between May and June of 1.05% and 0.69% respectively. During the same period, however, Nationwide reported 1.24% growth in prices. Land Registry slightly lagged, although arguably more accurate, data pointed to average prices across England and Wales growing by just 0.28% (from £220,094 in April to £220,713 in May); Rightmove asking prices slightly recovered from a 0.37% drop in June, yet only marginally rose to 0.1% in July.  According to Rightmove director Miles Shipside: “prices are in the summer... [Read More]

The Future of Student Housing

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Held in late June 2017, this half-day conference explored some of the issues of the day facing the student housing sector – with a range keynotes and panel discussions involving investors, agents, sector professionals, amongst other stakeholders and representatives.  Topics approached included the current state of play and challenges; ongoing investment interest; an innovative student mortgage finance model; perspectives from a student landlord; how to balance quality with affordability; student housing development financing and some direct insights into how the sector is attending to real student needs. We have outlined some of the key takeaways from these presentations over this long-form post.  Please click on the links in the contents box below to head to specific topics of interest and use the arrows to scroll back up. The State of Play and Challenges for the Student Housing Sector  Karen Burke,... [Read More]

Rightmove´s Head of Lettings on the Current State of Play

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Below are some of the highlights of a recent conversation we had with Sam Mitchell, Head of Lettings at Rightmove – largely based on the portal´s Q2 2017 Rental Tracker: The quarterly data is extracted from Rightmove´s portal, based on properties marketed by both online and offline letting agents. Achieved rents may be lower and even higher, relative to the level of demand; The Q2 figures revealed that, while the national average asking rent (excluding Greater London) rose by 1.9%, Greater London´s rental values actually dropped by 3.2% (with a quarterly drop of 0.2%); However, the general feeling moving forward is that the supply of rental property is likely to be constricted as a result of the 3% Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) surcharge implemented in April 2016, Section 24 of the Finance (No. 2) Act 2015 and Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) stricter borrowing... [Read More]

Commentary on the July 2017 Property Investor´s Factfile

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July 2017 Property Investor´s Factfile The Property Investor Blog´s monthly factfile presents a range of relevant data from national / London house prices, the latest buy to let Limited Company (SPV) loan rates, LIBOR / SWAP rates and rentals to mortgage debt figures and information on the first-time buyer sector.  Some noteworthy observations from the last month are outlined below: According to Rightmove asking prices for UK homes fell by 0.37% in June, the first price drop in the month since 2009. Director Miles Shipside attributed this to buyers´ confidence being “affected by inflation outstripping their pay packets” in addition to “current political events”. The figures were indeed based on properties advertised between May 14 and June 10 (therefore largely covering the weeks preceding the general election); Data from the Halifax reported a 0.48% rise in prices between and April and May; Whilst the latest Nationwide... [Read More]

Private Rented Sector Growth & The Expansion of Build to Rent (Bisnow)

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Below is a summarised write-up of three broadly overlapping build to rent (BTR) panel discussions from a mid-May 2017 Bisnow event.  Drawing on both domestic and global expertise, the discussions covered a number of relevant topics from managing the sector´s growing pains, the future sustainability of the “wall” institutional funding driving progress in addition to some interesting operation-led feedback and discussions on the issue of affordability. What Can the British Private Rented Sector Learn from the US? Moderated by Mike Kavanau, senior managing director at Chicago commercial real estate brokers HFF, the comparatively smaller panel of the day started with Michael Ablon, Principal and founding partner at Texas-based PegasusAblon sharing his experiences of the developing build to rent (BTR) projects in the Dallas / Fort Worth areas.  Like much of urban US, this region has seen noticeable signs of densification and... [Read More]