New research by lettings inventory and property compliance specialists, VeriSmart, has looked at the value of the English and London rental markets and how they stack up when compared to the GDP of global nations.
VeriSmart looked at the average annual rent paid across both the private and social rental sectors, before multiplying these figures by the total number of rental households in each sector to ascertain the total value of the national rental market. With 3,939,000 social renters paying an annual sum of £5,304 and 4,524,000 private tenants paying an annual sum of £10,128, the combined annual value of the rental market in England is £66.7bn.
In London alone, the annual rental market is worth £21.8bn, with the social rental sector bringing in £4.6bn a year and £17.2bn coming from the private sector.
To put this into perspective, if the rental sector across England were to sit in the GDP global rankings, it would rank higher than 159 world nations and land between Sri Lanka and Ethiopia. London alone would rank higher than 124 world nations and rank just behind Latvia and one place above North Korea.
Jonathan Senior, commented: “We’ve seen a wavering degree of confidence in the UK rental market of late from buy-to-let landlords and investors and who can really blame them given the relentless campaigns by the Government to reshuffle the deck at their expense.
Despite these attacks, the backbone of the UK rental market remains strong and it's still one of the safer investments one can make. As this research proves there is still a huge appetite for good, honest landlords with suitable rental properties and the collective return available for them is greater than the GDP of over a hundred and fifty global nations.
I’m not sure how Kim Jong Un will feel about it though. On one hand, he’s facing off with the largest global power in the world and on the other, he’s being trumped for value by the rental value of the London market.”
