Rental Market Update: Professional Lets

HOP’s Pudsey Branch is reporting the busiest start to a year that we’ve ever known.

Our Pudsey Team – headed up by Branch Manager, Tom Wild – specialises in rental properties for professional tenants. It manages a residential portfolio worth £124 million, with a wide catchment area that spans the popular towns and villages of West Leeds, and into both Leeds and Bradford.

We are seeing an enormous demand for rental properties and our most recent stats reveal some interesting facts about the current state of the rental market in the city.

1. Approximately 20% of HOP’s tenants are currently renting whilst they search for a home to buy.
2. Up to 40% of our renters are currently saving for a deposit.
3. While 40% of tenants are serial renters who appreciate the flexibility that renting a home affords them.

The Leeds rental market is currently moving incredibly quickly, with many properties renting within a matter of days and, in some cases, just hours of being listed.

According to Q1 stats from Rightmove, tenant demand is up by 6% across Great Britain, while the number of available properties is 50% lower than this time a year ago – and we’re seeing similar patterns in the Leeds market, partly due to a shortage of stock in the sales market, driving more people to look for rented accommodation.

HOP Pudsey’s Branch Manager, Tom Wild, said:

“The shortage of stock of homes for sale is definitely having an impact on the rentals market. A fifth of tenants renting with us are doing so because they have sold their property and are waiting for the right home to come up for sale.

This, in turn, is having a knock-on effect on the kinds of properties that are in demand.

“In recent weeks we’ve let a large home in the Yorkshire Dales for £2,200 per month and a five-bedroom home in Cookridge for £1,600 per month, in just a couple of days. Three-bedroom homes are currently extremely sought-after and are being snapped up within a matter of hours of listing them.

“Our continued investment in technology means we offer detailed interactive Matterport virtual tours as part of our marketing package. These tours, alongside accurate descriptions and professional photography, has resulted in an increasing number of tenants signing up for properties without even visiting them in person.

“In fact, 10% of tenants will now sign for a property from the virtual tour alone, without physically viewing it, in order to secure a home more quickly.”

With the lettings market hotter than ever, we’re keen to replenish our stocks of quality rental properties and would urge both existing landlords – and any empty property owners – to contact us now, to arrange a free rental valuation.

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