Posts Tagged ‘lettings agents’
A Truly Extraordinary Week for Mergers and Acquisitions
This has been a truly extraordinary week for mergers and acquisitions activity in the lettings sector. On Monday the private equity investor ICG spent £450 million buying Lomond Group. Just 28 hours later they bought the largest remaining independently owned letting agency in London, Kinleigh Folkard and Hayward. KFH is an extraordinary business. I undertook…
Read MoreWhy You Must Take Compliance Seriously
Almost every week we read about another letting agent who has had to pay an enormous fine for a compliance mistake but if my experience is anything to go by a great many letting agents are still making elementary compliance mistakes. So what are the most common problems that I am seeing? The first is…
Read MoreWhat Will Labour Do To CGT?
There have been a number of articles in the press recently that suggest that Labour might align CGT rates with income tax rates. This would have a catastrophic impact on landlords who wish to dispose of an investment property or business owners who wish to retire. At the moment a higher rate tax payer who…
Read MoreWhat Would A Labour Government Mean For Letting Agents?
It now seems almost certain that we will elect a Labour government on 4th July. So, what will this mean for letting agents? Well, this depends on the size of their victory and the type of Labour government that we get. If the election is a landslide our new government will have much more confidence…
Read MoreWhat impact will an agency sector dominated by mega-businesses have on us independents?
Adam Walker (right), a well-known broker who specialises in selling letting businesses, recently wrote a very interesting piece about the consolidation of the lettings industry where he forecast “that within the next five to ten years the lettings market will be dominated by a small number of mega-businesses with independent agents becoming increasingly rare”. If…
Read MoreA Huge Vote Of Confidence In The Letting Market
The recent sales of Stirling Ackroyd, Chestertons and Alexander & Co represents a huge vote of confidence in the UK letting market. Despite endless articles about the decline of the buy to let market, it seems that a private equity fund and a large European property conglomerate still have enough confidence in the sector to…
Read MoreAre Letting Agents Responsible For Rent Increases?
Letting agents are now regularly being accused of profiteering from the shortage of rental property by pushing up rent. This is an absurd allegation but it is worth looking at what factors are responsible for the huge increases that we have seen in property rents over the last few years. The answer of course is…
Read MoreDon’t Forget The Customer
I don’t usually write about the same subject twice but this subject is an important one which is very relevant to letting agents and a lot has changed since I wrote about it last year. The topic is the rapid consolidation of the veterinary sector. Over 50% of all veterinary practices are now owned by…
Read MoreThe Impact of Higher Interest Rates
Interest rates are now at their highest rate for 15 years and the whole country is reeling from the impact. So far, letting agents have been relatively unaffected. Some landlords are leaving the sector because they cannot afford the increase in their mortgage payments but increased rents have more than compensated for the lost fee…
Read MoreWill The Buy to Let Sector Survive?
Our government seems to be intent on destroying the buy to let sector. Changes to taxation have made it far more difficult for landlords with mortgages to make a satisfactory return on their investment. Frequent changes to legislation have imposed huge extra costs on landlords and have left them in fear of being hit with…
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