Property investment landlords should head for Peterborough as it is the best area in England to buy a rental property.

This claim is made in a new monthly Yield Index produced by independent estate and letting agent haart.

It shows that the annual returns on a typical one, two and three-bedroom property in the town are higher than anywhere else, including London.

A buy to let investor purchasing a one-bedroom apartment in Peterborough would expect a yield of 8.7 percent per annum while a two-bedroom apartment would generate a yield of 9 percent per annum. A three-bedroom house would generate a slightly more modest 6.7 percent per annum.

The East of England as a whole currently offers the best rental yields of all the English regions in which haart operates, closely followed by the East Midlands, South Yorkshire and then surprisingly London.

The latter continues to remain one of the most popular areas of England in which to invest with yields ranging from 5 to 7 percent widely achievable across many areas of the capital for one, two and three-bedroom properties.

Andrew Benn, MD of haart Residential Lettings, said : “While London and the South East has traditionally been the focal point for the majority of buy to let activity, we are starting to see investors focus more on other parts of the country, such as Peterborough, which thanks to rising rents, are offering prospective landlords annual returns of up to 9 percent, a yield they simply wouldn't be able to achieve with other forms of mainstream investment.”

• Yorkshire Building Society has taken another step in the buy to let mortgage market by extending the geographical reach of its proposition to cover loans on suitable properties across England and Wales.

The Yorkshire entered the buy to let market in August 2011, offering a range of products through its intermediary lending subsidiary, Accord Mortgages, initially in London and the South East.  The Society has since gradually added further products to the range.

Yorkshire’s head of buy to let, Jeremy Law, said: “We have always been open about our intentions to roll-out our buy to let offering to a wider geographical area and the expansion across England and Wales will represent the next step in our staged entry into buy to let.

“We’ve taken the last few months to ensure our processes are in place and to seek feedback from our lending partners, which has resulted in a review of our criteria and a number of key changes.”
Changes to the Society’s criteria include:

• The minimum property value will reduce from £150k to £100k
• The minimum applicant age will reduce from 30 to 25
• The lifting of a 40 mile distance from borrower to property location restriction
• Broker-certified copies of documentation will now be accepted instead of original documents being required
• The minimum income for an applicant will reduce from £35k to £20k

Buy to let will continue to form part of Accord Mortgage’s mortgage range, recently expanded to include 90 percent LTV residential loans. 

Law added: “We do not see ourselves as dipping in and out of the market, we are very much here to stay and will be an active lender in the market all year round.”