I’ve just read an interesting blog post by David Lawrenson over at Letting Focus about a potentially expensive pitfall for tenants in the whole lease option idea.
A lease option basically works like this:
• Tenant rents property in usual way
• Landlord offers option to buy within a defined period (a year or two, for example) at [...]

Back in 1997 popular beat combo The Verve wrote themselves into rock history with their acclaimed third album, Urban Hymns.
It’s probably best know for the anthemic “Bitter Sweet Symphony” and the equally cheery “The Drugs Don’t Work” but Richard Ashcroft was obviously in a happier mood when he wrote “Lucky Man”, the third single …maybe [...]

The last we heard from Jamie Oliver on the property front he was dishing out £3.25 million to buy his neighbour’s house in celeb hotspot Primrose Hill. The plan, apparently, was to knock the two into one vast 19-bedroom mega mansion.
When he’s not there Oliver, presumably, is out at his country estate pottering around like [...]

This week’s linear lovely comes from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors’ latest lettings market survey.
What’s it telling us? Basically that the decline in rents is slowing.  Or in their own words:
“A slowdown in the number of properties coming on to the rental market saw the rate at which rents decreased ease slightly in the [...]

Back to your kennels, Andrex puppies, there’s a new dog on the block.
TV’s latest canine superstar, Churchill, is now available in cuddly toy form.  And – cute, cute, CUTE! – when you squeeze his tummy, he mutters his famous catchphrase.  Ohhhh Yesss.
So how much is that doggy from the advert?  A mere £14.99 – of [...]

Here’s a new video about rent arrears from the Ministry of Justice.
It’s presented by District Judge Stephen Gold, who, presumably, knows a thing or two about landlord/tenant disputes.
His … err … Worship? Lordship? … is a rather dapper looking chap, not, we think, the type to gaze down from the bench and loftily enquire of [...]

The April edition of the FindaProperty.com Rental Index has hit the virtual shelves, with the headline:
“Two-Tier Rental Market Emerges: Houses Begin Recovery Whilst Flats Continue To Suffer”
Click here to read more headlines from the April Rental Index or click here to download the full Rental Index pdf. ( 1.7MB approx)
Alternatively if you prefer a more [...]

This week’s graph is from the FindaProperty.com Rental Index for March.
The solid line shows the monthly change in rental values while the red dotted line shows the monthly change averaged over three months.
What’s interesting about this is the gradual slowdown in the pace of price falls, a trend matched by the slowdown in the amount [...]

If you’ve seen the new FindaProperty.com Rental Index, but haven’t had the time to skim through its unique overview of the UK lettings market, then you can now watch our Head of Research, Andrew Smith, talking to Cantos about the Index and giving you all the juicy bits:

Well, it’s been a week since our moving out/moving in adventures, and my, what a bundle of fun it’s been.
We’ve had tears, we’ve had a tantrum – more about that later – and we’ve even had tentative excitement about the new house: we think we’re going to like living there!Â
A week in, and it’s beginning [...]