A new initiative to bring local authorities and residential landlords closer together has been launched by the Residential Landlords Association (RLA).
The Local Authority Network is designed to involve local councils, share information and promote best practice.
The network offers special RLA membership to local authorities, creating a new level of relationship between council members, officials and approved buy to let private landlords.
The local authorities get access to RLA training courses for their staff and local landlords, access to their consultants, speakers for their forums and a special page on the RLA website to share information and promote their events.
Interested landlords, anywhere in the country, who have listed the local authority areas in which their properties are let, will automatically be alerted about the events, which could include networking meetings, exhibitions and training courses.
“It's a way of developing dialogue and building trust between local authorities and landlords,” said Alan Ward, RLA chairman.
“The RLA has spearheaded closer working partnerships between landlords and town halls for more than 10 years and we have grown closer as the principal of formally accredited landlords has grown on a national scale.
“Now we work together on training and landlord development courses, are represented on local and national government bodies, speak at their conferences, seminars and landlord events.
“And the end result includes clearer understanding of the way we both operate, better trained and more professional private sector residential landlords and improving standards of rented accommodation.
“All that adds up to a better foundation for a more trusting future system of accredited self-regulating landlords working more closely with their local authorities.”
RLA members own more than 100,000 properties in the UK’s private rented sector.
• New statistics now value the UK’s private rented sector (PRS) at a staggering £500 billion.
And individual landlords own 73 percent of the properties within this sector.
While social housing and new builds are suffering, forecasting a housing crisis, some experts are now saying that the future lies in the PRS.
While once viewed as housing the poor and the vulnerable members of the population, Legal 4 Landlords believes the PRS is now supporting the housing needs of people from every class in the spectrum.
Landlords are experiencing a decline in rental arrears as tenant demand increases, creating 5.5 tenants to each available vacant property, allowing more choice of tenant for the landlord.
Evictions and notices are also declining suggesting a 'settling in' and acceptance of the recent shift in tenanted accommodation trends.
Sim Sekhon, industry spokesman and senior partner for Legal 4 Landlords, said: “June saw our highest number of tenant reference requests and our regional franchise opportunities are selling faster than originally anticipated.
“It's clear that the increasing tenant demand is having a tremendous effect on all sectors operating within and around the private rented sector."
