ARLA, the Association of Residential Letting Agents, has welcomed the provisions to stimulate the Private Rented Sector contained in the Rugg Review presented to the government this week.
The report also contains proposals for licensing, redress and tackling the problems caused by bad residential landlords and agents.
“The Private Rented Sector has been well served by the small landlord. Without this backbone, the sector would never have been revitalised and the housing market would be having even more problems,” said Ian Potter, ARLA's Head of Operations.
“Professor Rugg's comments are very welcome. Stimulating the sector will do much to help us through the difficult times ahead and at very little cost to the exchequer.”
Although agreeing with the Professor Rugg's call for licensing, ARLA points out that the Association has been calling for the licensing of all letting agents for more than a decade and is pleased that this demand has now been backed up.
The Association also pointed out that, together with other professional bodies in the property sector, it already operates independent redress systems which have the interests of the consumer in mind.
Potter added: “The coupling of light touch regulation of landlords, the licensing of agents and the need to encourage small scale landlords into the market, as called for in the Rugg Review, will, hopefully, bring about a sea change in government assistance for the Private Rented Sector with changes in the fiscal regime for landlords and an acknowledgement that REITS cannot satisfy the needs of the residential rental market.”
• A landlord who rented out a property which had been closed by the council because it was a fire hazard is facing prison if he does not pay his £4,000 fine.
A court was told that the flats on Hayling Island in Hampshire had no working smoke alarms, smoke detectors or fire extinguishers. There were also wires hanging from the ceilings and no lighting in a communal stairway.
The landlord, Christopher Mincham, appealed against his conviction at Portsmouth Crown Court but it was rejected by Judge Peter Ralls QC who warned him that he could go to prison if he fails to pay the fines for the offences which were discovered during an unannounced inspection by environmental health officers in December 2006.
Mincham, of Beach Road, Hayling, was declared bankrupt in August 2007. The flats have been repossessed but the fine is still outstanding.
