According to new data, the average UK rent has fallen for the first time in seven years.
Rent starting in May of this year was an average of £901, down 0.3 percent of the monthly rent in May 2016. This is the first such fall recorded by HomeLet since December 2009.
London has seen the biggest fall in average rent, which has decreased by three percent. Tenants in London are paying an average of £1,502, rather than the average of £1,572 from July last year.
HomeLet’s chief executive Martin Totty said: “May 2017 saw average rents nationally fall for the first time in eight years when the economy had suffered the shock of the financial crisis.
“Homelet rental data suggests landlords are now facing a difficult balancing act between ensuring rents are affordable for tenants in a low real wage growth environment whilst covering their own rising costs.
“Tenants will still need a vibrant and growing rented sector to provide them with property options at the time of their choosing. Any constraint on the supply of rental properties, because landlords are unable to achieve the reasonable returns they require, cannot be in the long-term best interests of tenants, especially if, as we’ve now heard from all the main political parties, the UK’s population continues to grow.”
In April, Your Move said that London had seen a sharp fall in rents over the past 12 months. This reflected the fact that many people looking for rental properties had switched their focus away from London and were looking elsewhere.
Other regions of the UK also saw rents on new tenancies fall throughout May. The north-east of England, the south-east, Yorkshire and Humberside, and Scotland all experienced falls ranging between 2.3 percent to 0.6 percent.