Research - almost half landlords don't regularly raise rents

Almost half tenants in the PRS have never seen their current landlords raise rents, according to new research from the NRLA.

The data comes from a survey of more than 2,000 tenants across England & Wales carried out earlier this year.

As our chart shows, almost half (45%) of tenants who have lived in a property for over a year have never experienced their current landlord increasing rents.

Just 16% said their landlords increase rents on an annual basis.

What does this mean?

The findings come at a time when the clamour for rent controls among tenant organisations is louder than ever, despite evidence of the damage rent controls would bring to the PRS.

Many forms of rent control would encourage landlords to introduce annual rent increases. For example, if there were restrictions on between-tenancy rent rises, landlords would need to ensure tenants received annual rent increases so the gap in rents between old and new tenant would not fall below market levels. Another example would be landlordswith flats, who could implement annual rent rises to protect against sudden increases in service charges or ground rent. 

More information

Other key results from the survey have been posted on our research blog here.