Landlords – this is how to beat the Tenant Tax

Over 90% of tenants look for new rental properties online, therefore making your property competitive is essential. The Tenant Tax (aka Section 24, which will be in full effect by April 2021), is going to cost any landlord with a mortgage over £2,000 extra a year in tax. A shocking 44% of landlords surveyed said they would be putting up prices to compensate but, this does not affect those landlords without a mortgage – which makes up half of all landlords – as such these landlords will be able to offer a simpler property at a better price, making them the opposite of competitive.

There are two far better options, luckily: market smart and cut costs elsewhere. After tax, a landlord’s next biggest costs are void periods and tenant finder’s fee. Leaving a property sitting empty because the landlord has priced themselves out of the market is ludicrous – especially when there are five tenants chasing every vacancy. Void periods and using a traditional letting agent both cost around £1,000 each, and the North East actually has the highest number of voids in the UK. With the Tenant Tax, as one lot of costs have skyrocketed, so it makes sense to cut back on these easily avoidable outgoings.   

Ollie, who marketed his two-bed house through Upad last month, says, ‘My dedicated account manager suggested using an internal picture as my advert’s main picture, advertising on Monday morning and writing the description in an online blog format – which got me three offers and let by that Wednesday.’ Marketing through an online letting agency like Upad leverages the expertise of people whose job it is to be on the cutting edge of the property market; they know when to post a property, what photography works and even provide guides for landlords on their online landlord hub that explain how to successfully market your property in 2019. As to whether it works? Upad’s let rate is a third higher than the average high street letting agent, sitting at over 90%.

Landlords also often turn to outdated marketing channels to save money – most of the time they are advertising in the wrong places like on Gumtree or with high street agents; yet an online agent can cost around a third of what a high street agent costs, as they simply don’t have office rents to pay for example. To find out all about the benefits of using an online letting agency, check out Upad’s website today – don’t let this new tax turn your property into yet another cost: https://www.upad.co.uk

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