1,927 Morley homes bought by landlords in last 10 years - is this the end for Morley first-time buyers?

I was enjoying a coffee in Cucina with a fellow Morley business owner recently, when a smart gentleman approached me. ‘Hello’, he said, ‘You are the person that writes that Property Blog aren’t you? We have met before at that Business Networking event in Morley a few months ago’. I did then recognise him and, whilst I won’t mention his name, he runs a well known business in the Morley area. Anyway, I was at a loose end for five or ten minutes before my next appointment, so we had a chat.

He wanted to know my thoughts on the future of the Morley property market. Here we go again I thought! People are always going to need a roof over their heads and somewhere to live will never go out of fashion – it’s a necessity for every single person. The 22 to 30 year olds of the town have a choice to what type of roof they have … they rent from the Council, they can rent from a private landlord or finally they can get a mortgage and buy one. In the 1970’s, 80’s and 90’s, the expected thing was to save like mad for two years for the deposit (going without luxuries) whilst living at home or renting a cheap two up two down, then buy your first house. However, more recently fewer Morley youngsters have been buying, choosing to rent instead – mainly from private landlords (as Councils have been selling off council housing on the Right to Buy Schemes). The numbers are truly staggering.

Roll the clock back 10 years and Morley was a different place. There were 22,734 households in Morley and 16,964 of those were owner occupied. Move to the present, surprisingly the total number of households has decreased by 12.4% to 19,919 and the number of owner-occupiers has decreased by 17.9% to 13,931.

However, it’s the rented sector that is truly fascinating … ten years ago, only 915 properties were privately rented in Morley … and now it’s 2,842, a rise of 1,927.

The twentysomethings of Morley housing difficulties haven’t been helped by the local authority selling off council housing, with the number of council houses dropping from 3,262 to 1,960 over the same ten-year period. Demand for decent rented property remains high, as Cameron’s much vaunted house building program is years away and has decades of under investment to catch up on before it starts to affect demand. Even with the Buy-to-Let tax rule changes over the coming few years (which will see the maximum tax relief available to landlords drop from 45% to 20%), private landlords still have an important role to play in housing the people of Morley and those who educate themselves and treat it as a business will survive and prosper.

The best way Morley landlords can protect their income from property (and mitigate the effects of the tax rises) is to keep the homes they let out in Grade A condition. I have found, especially over the last couple of years, Morley tenants have ever growing demands from their rental property, but many are prepared to pay ‘top dollar‘ for houses and apartments that meet their high expectations. You must not forget, letting property in Morley (in fact anywhere) is a business, so all private landlords should also seek the advice, opinion and commentary of property professionals.

… And just as I was about dash off, he asked ‘What about the impact of Stamp Duty changes for Landlords since April?’ My thoughts are with such low supply (i.e. numbers of property for sale), and high demand it is hard to imagine Morley property values will see much impact, they haven’t thus far – but I predict, ever so slightly, the proportion of owner occupiers should increase slightly compared to Buy-to-Let landlords in the coming decade as the housing market should return to balance.

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