Investment Property News

The Private Housing (Tenancies) (Scotland) Act 2016, which takes effect from 1 December 2017, will introduce the ‘private residential tenancy’. Its purpose is to improve security for tenants and provide safeguards for landlords, lenders and investors. We have studied the changes and below covers the landlord view.

The new tenancy will be open-ended and will last until a tenant wishes to leave the let property or a landlord uses one (or more) of 18 grounds for eviction.

Improvements for landlords include:

• no more confusing pre-tenancy notices, such as the AT5
• where a tenant is in rent arrears, a landlord can refer a case for repossession more quickly
• a Scottish Government recommended ‘model tenancy agreement’, which will include standardised tenancy terms
• a digital version of the Scottish Government ‘model tenancy agreement’, which will include discretionary terms that can be edited, allowing landlords to easily put together and send out a tenancy agreement suitable for their specific property
• one simple notice when regaining possession of a property called a ‘notice to leave’ – this will replace the current ‘notice to quit’ and ‘notice of proceedings’
• eighteen modernised grounds for repossession, which include new grounds where the property has been abandoned or the landlord intends to sell

In our opinion the introduction of Private Residential Tenancies is simply a legislative change which landlords should not be overly concerned with.

The Scottish Government website provides further information.

To find out more about letting your property in Edinburgh, call our letting team on 0131 473 1591, or use our online contact form.

One of the first questions landlords ask is whether to rent out their property furnished or unfurnished? There are of course pros and cons to both and differing target markets require different approaches.

The Positives of Unfurnished

• Less initial set up cost to landlord and less responsibility.
• Tenants may stay longer as they have made an investment in furniture and moving will be more costly.
• If there is tenant demand then rental income may be equal to furnished.

The Positives of Furnished

• Generally, there are more tenants looking for furnished property which means a higher rent and more applicants to choose from.
• You, the landlord, only need buy the furniture once and will have made sure it is the right style and size for the property.
• A nicely furnished property looks move inviting and homely than one devoid of furniture.

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Back in January 2012 we posted an article in which the CEBR (Centre for Economics and Business Research) forecast interest rates would remain at 0.5 per cent until 2016. As it turned out they were pretty accurate with rates dropping to 0.25 per cent in August 2016. Whilst they predicted rates would start to rise in 2016 it should be remembered that we have had a number of unforeseen political and economic changes since the summer of 2016.

A snippet of the article is below with the full article here.

The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR), a leading think tank with an excellent record for correctly forecasting economic performance has said that it believes interest rates will remain at 0.5 per cent until 2016.

The CEBR made the right call on a variety of forecasts for the economy in 2011, beating virtually all other analysts and winning all prizes from organisations that rank prediction success in the UK.

The organisation believes that the Bank of England will hold interest rates at their historic low of 0.5 per cent into 2016. If base rate did stay at that level until January 2016, it would make it an unprecedented 81 months of no change in base rate, the longest period of static rates since the 1940’s.

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Following June’s EU Referendum we have seen a record number of enquiries from overseas investors requesting our guidance on buy to let within the capital. There a number of factors which have resulted in this surge including the weakened pound which makes purchasing more affordable, particularly for those paying in Euros and Dollars.

Additionally, the London property market is viewed by some as overheated resulting in investors targeting other areas of the UK which provide better value for money and higher rental yields. With Edinburgh providing solid rental returns along with historically strong capital growth we predict the number of overseas investors contacting ourselves to increase for the foreseeable future.

To find out more about buying an investment property in Edinburgh and how we can help you, call 0131 473 1591 or use our online contact form.

We look forward to hearing from you.