In this special episode of The LandlordZONE, host Nigel Lewis sits down with Eddie Hooker, CEO of private rented sector experts Total Property, to unpack the results of the 2024 Total Property Survey. With insights from nearly 3,500 landlords, tenants, and agents, this survey reveals the biggest challenges and trends shaping the rental market.
From rising rents and regulatory pressures to energy efficiency and the looming impact of the Renters’ Rights Bill, Eddie shares expert analysis on what these findings mean for landlords—and how they can navigate an increasingly complex landscape. Whether you're a seasoned investor or new to the sector, this episode is packed with valuable insights to help you stay ahead. For more details, read Total Property’s private rented sector survey 2024 report.
Nigel Lewis: Hello, my name is Nigel Lewis. I'm head of content at LandlordZONE and we are here today to talk to Eddie Hooker because the annual survey of over three and a half thousand landlords and tenants to find out well, really take the pulse of the private rented sector. It's a unique report and the output of it I think is really interesting. I'm a journalist so I would say that, but we're here to discuss really what that means for you, the landlord, you, the tenant, or you the agent for that matter. However, so Eddie, why did you call Total Property Total Property, and what is it?
Eddie Hooker: Well, it's quite simple, Nigel. It's an overarching brand of our main products and services that we sell. So for those of you that know us and have listened to our podcasts, my company runs mydeposits, which is a tenancy deposit scheme. It runs Property Redress, Total Landlord, Client Money Protect, LandlordZONE is part of the group, and Total Property is just an overarching brand and technology solution that brings all of those brands together. So, but overall the databases that we manage, you know more than 400,000 landlords work with us, more than 20,000 letting agents. I haven’t calculated the number of tenants, so we're in a very good position to actually get a really good feel for what the market trends are, what the market is looking for, where the pinch points in the current market is and every year we do a pulse.type review of that database and three and a half thousand landlords we feel is quite a good section of that database, bearing in mind a lot of people won't…
Nigel Lewis: Yeah, the accepted value is anything over 1000 has value as research.
Eddie Hooker: Absolutely. And we will use that data that we're getting to try and educate more the market on what's happening and to refine products and services that we actually offer to make sure they become a little bit more relevant, but overall Total Property is just like a vessel that sits over, but most people are interacting with the individual brands.
Nigel Lewis: To call it ‘Almost Property’ would be …
Eddie Hooker: Otherwise, I'm sitting in interviews like this where I'm saying I'm Eddie Hooker, CEO of mydeposits, Total Landlord, and it all gets a bit confusing
Nigel Lewis: Total property it has to be. Absolutely. Good. OK. So the report, which by the time this goes out, I'm right in saying will be out and live and you’ll be able to read this yourself. However, for the moment, we're going to try and pick out some of the stand out stuff. Certainly from my point of view as a Head of Content at LandlordZONE, but before we just explore some of it. So the one thing which stood out for me was that in fact a lot of landlords have been in the game a long time and that quite a low percentage are recent entrants. Talk to me about that. Why? Why do you think that is?
Eddie Hooker: Well, I think you know you've got to go back a little bit, a lot of landlords entered the marketplace when the buy to let boom happened. If you, if those of you that are a little bit around my age. And I'm not going to disclose how old I am
Nigel Lewis: 43
Eddie Hooker: 23. I thought you said! Landlords, you know, that the world has changed pre, in the year 2000/2001 when the buy to let boom happened and what happened there was that the market welcomed the landlord community, mortgages became much more freely available to landlords.
A bit later on, George Osborne changed the whole pension rules and people were starting to take out money out of their pensions. And of course, we were brought up in an age where property was the best investment you could have. So a lot of people jumped on round about that time into the buy to let marketplace. That was 26 years ago, can you imagine that? So a lot of landlords are now getting to that, what I call retirement age. And I think what's coming out of that survey is that a lot of the changes, it's uncertainty of where the market is going, we've had a successive government parliaments that have been a lot more. And I use the word carefully. Anti landlord or more can we say pro tenant governments? Because there’s obviously a lot more tenants out there than there are landlords and governments like votes.
Nigel Lewis: Yep.
Eddie Hooker: And obviously there’s a lot more social awareness out there. So what you're tending to find, I think is that a lot of landlords who have had a stability in the letting sector for the last 25 years when they you know, and then successive legislative changes have made it a lot more difficult. So I'm not surprised that we're seeing a shortage of housing stock.
Nigel Lewis: Which the report highlights.
Eddie Hooker: Yeah, the population is growing. You know, migration is growing. Mortgages are hard to come by. Wages haven't really kept up with the rate of inflation over the last few years. And of course, we're now in the cost of living crisis, with interest rates going through the roof. So I'm not surprised that we're seeing in the survey affordability issues for tenants. Shortage of housing stock, which I think everyone talks about and a natural now churn of the type of landlord that we're starting to see coming into the market.
There's another stat that's come out that actually over the last two to three years, only about 7% of the people that we've surveyed were new into the sector. Now people will say, well, that's quite low. But again, in times of uncertainty, people tend to hold on to their money. They don’t do as much investment. They're not saving as much, so I think once the Renters’ Rights Bill has come out, once people understand where the marketplace is going, I think you'll see a bit more confidence from investment coming in to the market.
Nigel Lewis: It’s quite interesting because the report says that, you know, basically two thirds of landlords think that the PRS – the private rented sector – has deteriorated, let's call it, which goes back to what you're saying, and half of agents think that as well, and they tend to be positive people.
Eddie Hooker: Well, absolutely. But again, remember where they've come from and there has been a lot of change. You know, starting from you know the tenant fee ban which has hit a lot of letting agents, you've got the section 24 tax issues now,.where chancellors are seeing the private rented sector as an opportunity to raise more tax. So of course things have changed and changed quite rapidly.
So I think there's definitely a concern from the landlording community about where will this end, but I still think property investment is always going to be a good bet for the longer term, because we'll ride out some of these changes and some of these changes actually when you look at them will be for the good of everybody.
Nigel Lewis: And one change which is going to be very much felt in the next two years or three years is the requirement to get a EPC in England up to C, it doesn't apply in Scotland, yet, Wales does apply. Not sure about Northern Ireland quite at the moment but the idea that a lot of landlords and obviously their agents, who are going to have to help do this stuff are, well, 60% have already done the upgrade, so that doesn't quite fall in with a lot of the research previously, which had said that landlords are worried about this, but in fact 60% have already done it. And that's quite amazing.
Eddie Hooker: Well, again there’s two main issues coming. across here, the first is that there are quite a lot of Victorian houses in the UK, especially in the north. Yeah, so they are very difficult to upgrade anyway. Yeah. So I would suggest that’s one of the reasons why some of the more modern blocks, which were already probably C or more easy to get to C, but I think some of the Victorian properties, you know the late 18th century early 20th century stock is a lot more difficult.
Remember, landlords have never had to do this before, you know, and we are in a different world again. We've got the energy crisis where tenants now the cost of living tenants are more socially aware. Energy, climate change is on the agenda. So there's a lot more demand from tenants than there was say in the early 2000s to the to the 2010s. And landlords now who've never had to do anything about this, it’s never been on anyone's agenda, and now suddenly you're getting a raft of legislation coming down. And quite rightly, I think landlords are thinking, where am I going to find the money to do this?
And I think that is the concern, when you look into it, a lot of properties are not expensive to upgrade. Bit of insulation here. Yes, I do think a lot of a new boiler, windows that should be replaced. But there's also a lot of help out there.
There’s government grants that you can get out there and I think landlords probably need to be a little bit more educated that they're not going to necessarily have to do all of this on their own. And also, I don't think a lot of landlords have to suddenly whack up rent for the tenant to pay for it, I think they need to do a bit more research. One area which I would push people towards is the NRLA. The National Residential Landlords Association. Who actually have got a lot of information on this.
And I think become more educated, become more widely read about the challenges and what you need to do and actually what some of the solutions that are there sitting for you if you know how to get hold of it.
Nigel Lewis: One thing I like about this report is it does.underpin my view, which is that there are two types of changes for landlords. One is the stuff which is going to be daily and immediate and of concern. And that includes I can't rent out these properties, not EPC ‘C’. Yep, because that happens every 3-4 years. So that's a sort of like, that's a thing, which happens quite a lot. And there's all thing about taking deposits, obviously, which is the oldest change, but still one which not every landlord sticks to.
And there's all different changes which have happened and are about to happen, which are very much day to day.
Eddie Hooker: 100%
Nigel Lewis: Then there's the stuff which only affects a small minority, but so section 21 causes you know and I’m guilty of this as an editor of a landlord website. You know it makes a good headline. You know, you know evictions are about to be severely complicated type of headline gets a lot of clicks but in reality it only probably affects. There's only about 30,000 evictions every year. Section 21.
I think I'm right in saying. I apologise if I'm wrong there, but that's pretty much the ballpark, so it only affects 30,000 out of 2.4 million landlords. So this report sort of basically says that as well, which is that landlords are worried about the immediate stuff. Tell me about that.
Eddie Hooker: So what I think - you've answered your own question there, but I let's move on a little bit more detail there. So the day-to-day, yes, so there will be day-to-day changes. So for example when you're letting your property, you've now got to take into consideration tenants with pets. Or your tenants with children you know, or more vulnerable tenants. So that's the some of the clauses in the tenancy agreement may become null and void. Yeah, I don't have, like, anybody, anyone sitting in front of me today and saying, well, that's going to change. We don't actually know the full detail, but there will be changes to the day-to-day running of your tenancy that you're going to have to be a little bit more mindful of.
EPC Cs coming up, gas safety and all of these sort of things which have been filtering in over the last few years. And then you've got the longer term issues. Yeah, which is a bit more preparation. So when we talk about section 21, remember what the Government's trying to do is say actually we are going to remove these fixed term tenancies. Yeah. And we're not going to have an end of specific end of tenancy which a landlord can then issue a Section 21 against. And what they're introducing is. We're not saying you can't bring back or say we the government aren't saying you can't have your property back, but what they're saying is that you've got to have the right reason for getting your property back.
And I think that's the preparation. So if you want to move into your property, let's say, I don't know, I've got a let property, I get divorced and I need a suddenly somewhere to live. Oh, I've got a flat. I've got a house which I'm renting out … at the moment. You just serve two months’ notice at the end of the tenancy and off you go. Now you're going to have to think about plan a little bit more if you're looking to sell the property, you're going to have to plan it a little bit more. And even if you're wrong on those numbers of 30,000 and I think it's a little higher than that, but let's say it's 100,000. You know there's eight million tenancies out in the UK. So it is a small number. And of course those people, it will affect.
Nigel Lewis: And it's a very serious position for them
Eddie Hooker: It will be a very serious position, but it's more about education, a criticism I'd have of the government is that we are effectively or supposed to be two months away from this act being enacted, or the bill being enacted.
And we don’t really understand about when this is likely to affect and how it will be rolled out, you know there's ten major parts of that bill. So for me, if I was a letting agent, if I was a landlord, I'd be looking at the legislation as we know it.
I wouldn't necessarily be making changes now, but I'd be preparing for it, but I still feel that property investment. Remember, the UK needs housing that is not going to change overnight is still a very good way of investing, yeah. But you need to be aware of the downsides of it. Like any investment, yeah.
Nigel Lewis: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the entry and exit, of course, are changing and yeah, yeah.
Eddie Hooker: You need. Yeah, you need plans. And there's a lot of people. As I said, the NRLA, people like Total Property and all of our brands and other organisations. There's a lot of information available, if you know where to look.
Nigel Lewis: And the report breaks that out, so I think that one of the last points that stand out so that we were going to talk about are that most , more than half of landlords consider their investment to be long term. Yeah, and are looking to remain in the sector. Oh, that sounds quite low. But in fact the other half probably are medium term or might be short term, but it's still a strategy, isn't it?
Eddie Hooker: 100%. So whenever you look at percentages, you know what we will look at is headline more than half of people want to get out of the sector. That's a very broad statement, and what the survey does not necessarily draw out is the actual individual reasons why they're trying to get out. You know, maybe they didn't want to get in the first place and they're an accidental landlord or.maybe they're a landlord who's running a probate process and they're getting out, or maybe actually some landlords are saying you may be 10/12 properties. I don't need 10/12 properties. I'm coming up to retirement. I'm going to offload a couple or I'm not going to buy some so, but I think the other point you mentioned is that half landlords are still confident. And the market is changing. You've got to bear that in mind. There's a lot of bigger organisations coming in. Beware, the devil is my argument to the government, which is you yes you want all of these corporate build to rent property companies, but they're generally very powerful companies, which the government traditionally have failed to manage in lots of other ways. So sometimes actually the smaller operator is a little bit more easy to turn and manipulate into where you want to go to so, but I think I'm confident I don't hear negativity. The letting agents I talk to, funnily enough Nigel, on that point are seeing this as a really good opportunity, the Renters’ Rights Bill.
Because with all new legislation comes new innovation, new ways of working, how to make a little bit more in, you know. Create a new revenue stream, for example, you know, so I'm looking at this actually this survey overall as actually quite a positive survey for the private rental sector. There's elements which are worrying.
But overall, I'm not reading here that the market is about to collapse tomorrow and you're going to be left with empty properties all over the place with no one wanting to buy them.
Nigel Lewis: One question for you though, is, if you had a magic wand, we're talking about it earlier. The one thing you could change about the industry, given your Total Property background and that you have involvement in so many areas of both managing and regulation of the industry, what would you like to see?
Eddie Hooker: I would like to see landlords being treated as businesses. And I think the biggest problem is I'm not sure you can change behaviour just by taxing people. You need to encourage people. So the section 24, you know, the mortgage interest relief bits. I mean, if we were a business, a properly constituted business that would be a cost we would be deducting before we pay corporation tax and I think the government need to look at the private rented sector as more of a professional business type approach, and that's where a lot of landlords are struggling at the moment and why rents are going up is because many landlords are just not making money. They're being taxed on losses rather than taxed on profits.
Nigel Lewis: That's on turnover.
Eddie Hooker: And they need to think about that. Because we need the private sector private rented sector, even if it's only for the next 15/20 years until they build all these magical houses. So if I had a magic wand, I would probably look at the taxation issue that landlords are finding themselves in and, I think that would that would encourage further investment. Because remember the build to rent scheme, they're all getting this tax advantage because they can deduct it. And of course, that's why they're seeing that as a really good investment opportunity. But landlords who run 80% of the private renting sector.
Nigel Lewis: Yeah, 1-2 properties. Yeah, you.
Eddie Hooker: You know, don't use a stick. Encourage people to learn. Encourage people to change. Look at the tax. That would be OK, but who am I?
Nigel Lewis: Well, we should see if your wish is granted in the next budget!
Eddie Hooker: I doubt it!
Nigel Lewis: Thank you very much indeed, Eddie. That was a nice chat and a brilliant way of exploring the report, which will have a link at the bottom of the bio in this video. So please do visit that to read the report. I urge you. Also, there'll be a link to the free landlord, Renters’ Rights course in the bio as well, which is a free way of finding out about the stuff we’ve been discussing.
Eddie Hooker: Thank you very much.
