LSL’s buy-to-let index also showed that in April 9.9% of all rent was late or unpaid, up from 8.7% in March.

The index shows that the average rent in England and Wales rose by 0.5% to £709 per month. Despite the monthly rise, the rate of annual increase steadied with rents 2.4% higher than a year ago, compared to 2.7% in March.

Read the full story at 24dash.com

RentPro property management software allows you to easily manage any rental arrears by alerting you as soon as they occur.

Firms signed up to the SAFEagent scheme are highlighting that landlords and tenants risk losing thousands of pounds in rents and deposits if an agent outside a money protection scheme shuts.

The most recent firm to go bust in Canterbury owes landlords and tenants more than £410,000.

Receivers have warned creditors are unlikely to see any of their cash.

Read the full story at Property118

RentPro property management software allows you to easily track deposits that are lodged with a deposit protection scheme.

Landlord confidence is running high with just 1 in 10 aiming to sell property or leave buy to let, with 31% set to expand their portfolios, while the rest continue with business as usual.

Almost a fifth of landlords (17%) have bought a rental property in the past year.

A concern for many (28%) is how rising mortgage rates may affect their cash flow and profitability, but generally, landlords are happy with their lot.

Read the full story on Property118

RentPro property management software has the flexibility to grow with your business.

The findings of this paper are that over the last three years new starts have been increasingly from new houses rather than flats, with “three or four bed houses now account(ing) for two thirds of all starts and the number of new two bed houses has surpassed the number of two bed flats being built”.

In regards to the recovery of starts around the country there is “a strong correlation between increased starts and the extent of the recovery in residential values” with only W and NW London bucking the trend with rises above the peak levels of 2007 for both volumes and prices.  Throughout the rest of the country although the volume of new starts has grown it is still “less than half that seen at the peak”.  Although in southern England there has been a shift in the supply/demand balance resulting in that “today one in every three new homes being built is a house in southern England.”  As the paper goes on to stipulate that although building in the south of England may appear to be of a low-risk developers need to be aware of the potential for “growing concentration of similar types of new supply in localised markets” and perhaps “wary of local competition and its potential impact on sales rates and net selling prices”.  Opportunities further afield need to be examined as they may prove to be not as risky.

Another interesting find for the lettings market is that although the Government has been introducing initiatives to boost the housing market, the NewBuy scheme with its mortgage rate at “around 5% are higher than the average rate on a typical new mortgage (3.5%).”  The result of this is that throughout the country for an average two bed new build property the “NewBuy … costs 25% more per week than renting”.

Read the full Paper at Hometrack

The government has announced £1.8 million of funding to help councils tackle the problem of ‘beds in sheds’.

Money will be allocated to nine councils where there is a particular problem with people trapped in unsanitary or cramped living conditions.

Housing minister Grant Shapps announced the initiative on Friday and said the nine ‘worst affected’ councils will receive funding. These include seven councils in London; Brent, Ealing, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Newham, Redbridge and Southwark, as well as Peterborough and Slough outside the capital.

Unscrupulous landlords tend to rent out ‘beds in sheds’ to migrants, often in the country illegally, at extortionate rates. The tenants often find it difficult to return home having destroyed their passports to prevent removal and will put up with poor conditions, such as hazardous wiring or poor sanitation, a Communities and Local Government spokesperson said.

Read the full story at Inside Housing some very interesting comments too worth reading.

With the exception of London, rental growth in 2011 was lower than in 2010 across all regions. Rents in London were up 9.6% in 2011 and although growth has slowed since Q3 it remains stronger than the rest of the UK. The continued growth in the capital’s rents reflect the sheer size of the city, the high cost of buying and the corporate rental sector which drives some of the highest rents in the country. In contrast, demand across other cities is largely domestic, driven by those unable to access owner occupation.

Read the full story at JungleDrum

RentPro property management software allows you to easily manage rents, tracking any arrears and also allows you to easily manage houses of multiple occupation.

The value of mortgages taken out to fund buy-to-let purchases rose by a third year-on-year to the first three months of 2012, as falling house prices and rising rents made the sector attractive to investors.

Some 32,300 loans worth a combined total of £3.7bn were advanced to buy-to-let borrowers, according to figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML). The value was 5% down on the final three months of 2011, but 32% higher than in the opening three months of the year. However, it remains at about a third of 2007′s levels.

Read the full story at The Guardian

RentPro property management software is built to grow with your business.

The average cost of renting a prime property in the UK is £1,238, some £369 a month less than the mortgage, research from PrimeLocation reveals.

RentPro property management software allows you to market properties not only on your own website but all major portals as well as producing brochures that can be either printed off or emailed to potential tenants.

According to the Guardian’s Polly Toynbee, it was nothing less than a “final solution” for the poor. The Labour shadow minister, Chris Bryant, called it the “sociological cleansing” of the capital. London Councils, the umbrella organisation of the capital’s boroughs, warned that almost a quarter of a million people faced eviction from their homes in the first year alone.

Read the full story The Telegraph

RentPro property management software assists you with tracking payments from both tenants and housing benefit authorities.

It’s always advisable, before signing a tenancy agreement, for a prospective tenant to seek legal advice in order to get a better idea of the terminology used and any repairing covenants which may be present within that agreement. This will give the tenant a clearer understanding of where their responsibilities lie with regard to repairs and redecoration.

Read the full article at MyPropertyPowerTeam

RentPro property management software lets you keep track of all repairs and correspondence with tenants, suppliers and landlords.