Skip to content- We are also asked what will be in store for the Rotherham Property market for the rest of 2020, whilst we are primarily a letting agent we are conscious that transaction sales (which were already down) will continue to remain low for the remainder of the year, which is bad news if your main focus is sales. For us at present, communication is key talking to tenants and landlords to ensure that if either party is having difficulty we are able to advise the best path forward.
We recently recorded a Zoom call with Steph Whiting from ‘SourceMyMortgage’ to give an insight into the current mortgage market and we hope to release this is the coming days. During lockdown we are going to zoom call further meetings with industry professionals that may be of interest to our landlords.
However despite the lockdown legislation continues:
Rotherham Selective licensing Scheme
On May 1st in Rotherham RMBC introduced a new 5 year selective license scheme
covering parts of Eastwood & town centre / Masborough / Maltby / Dinnington /
Parkgate and Thurcroft. The good news is that the council has stated ‘the initial
application period can be postponed until the 30th September without incurring
any penalty or being in breach of the licence scheme. As before the licence will be
back dated to the scheme start date of 1st May 2020 and run for 5 years’
New Electrical safety standards are coming soon to the PRS.
The Government we understand, still plans to introduce mandatory electrical
inspections in premises let to one or more people who are occupying the
premises as their only or main residence and paying rent.
These regulations will apply to new tenancies from 1st July 2020 and will be
rolled out to all existing tenancies from 1st April 2021.
So it might be good to get these done at the earliest wherever possible (social
distancing applies) as electricians are going to be flooded with orders which will
only increase the cost.
- With a stagnant property market and the mortgage options reduced we believe
our ‘Rent to Own’ product will become increasingly popular.
What is Rent to Own?
The concept of Rent to Own has been around for many centuries in one form or
another and has been used commercially by house builders since the early
1900s. How it works present day is very simple…
In short, we will be letting properties on behalf of landlords to a ‘Tenant Buyer’
who has aspirations of owning their own home one-day. This Tenant Buyer will
rent the property at a pre-agreed rental price for a pre-agreed term (typically 5-
10 years). At the end of the period, the Tenant Buyer will have the option to buy
the property at a pre-agreed price!
In addition to the monthly rent, the Tenant Buyer pays a top-up fee, which goes
to save for a deposit for a mortgage at the end of the term. They don’t have to
complete the purchase at the end of the pre-agreed period but if not, they would
lose all the top-up fee.
In the current and foreseeable climate it can may be hard to purchase or sell a
property but with Rent to Own, Tenant Buyers who are not in the position to
purchase can find their dream home and live in it now rather than wait 5, 10 or
15 years down the line.
If this is something of interest don’t hesitate to contact enquiries@bricknellsrentals.
co.uk or 01709 365584.
