Summer issue
Contents Our products Making some MEES time News flash
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Check out our site for free advice, guides and videos... Making some MEES time
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Magazine
Welcome!
Check out our site for free advice, guides and videos
Guide to choosing a letting agent
Welcome to our special Cover4LetProperty newsletter for landlords. As a valued property insurance customer, we thought we’d remind you of all the useful information you can find on our website, provide details of our product range, as well as share some of the latest landlords’ news.
At Cover4LetProperty, we like to add value - not just to our products and services, but by providing useful, free advice on our website too.
This guide discusses DIY letting versus employing letting agent as well as those important questions you need to ask when looking for a letting agency.
If you haven’t been on our website for a while, make sure you visit and take a look at some of our latest news, articles and guides. For You can find more of our free guides at: http://www. cover4letproperty.co.uk/guides/ and our quick read articles at: example, here is just a snapshot of what is on offer: http://www.cover4letproperty.co.uk/articles/.
We hope you enjoy this newsletter. If you have any comments or questions, please do not hesitate to get in touch - we would love to hear from you. Richard Burgess, MCIM, ACIEH, Cert CII Director
Want to read more?
Finding your next investment property
This guide explains the different way you can find your next investment, from going to auctions to using property groups; buying off-plan to chatting to your local estate agent.
Guide to landlord associations Why should you consider joining a landlord association? What are the benefits? Plus, read through our list of regional and local associations near to you.
Videos We have several quick videos you may find useful, which you can access here, entitled: Landlord Insurance Key Facts Documents, Landlord Renovation Insurance, Why are tenant types important to insurance companies, and Do I need a specialist unoccupied property insurance policy?
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Magazine
Contents Our products Making some MEES time News flash
Our products At Cover4LetProperty we do more than offer what we believe is competitively-priced, comprehensive landlords insurance – we provide a range of great value products to help support you and your investment business. Here is a quick recap …
What to know more about our products? Visit www.cover4letproperty.co.uk or gives us a call on 0800 9707 172
Landlords insurance
Unoccupied property insurance
Commercial property insurance
Our landlords insurance offers comprehensive protection, whether you are insuring one or several properties. All our policies include malicious damage and subsidence cover as standard – unlike many other buildings insurance providers.
Whether you are a landlord with an empty property just waiting for a tenant or property owner whose own home will be unoccupied for a few months, then it is important that your property has suitable insurance.
Commercial property owners insurance is important for the many different risks your commercial property faces. That is why we offer bespoke packages, designed to meet your individual requirements, as well as your budget.
Rent guarantee and legal protection Renovation insurance / properties undergoing works If your empty property is undergoing renovation, you need to make sure it is properly protected with our specialist renovation insurance cover. Policy features are flexible, meaning you get the cover you need.
UK holiday home insurance Your second or holiday home is just as important to you as your main residence. We provide what we believe is affordable cover for your UK holiday home, giving you complete peace of mind that is adequately protected. Cover includes legal liability up to £2m, and up to £5m for domestic staff; optional accidental damage cover; cover for periods of unoccupancy, and much more!
Rent guarantee insurance gives you the peace of mind that should your tenant fall in to rent arrears, or absconds owing you outstanding monies, then this insurance will step in and compensate you up to £1,500 per month for a maximum of 6 months (or until vacant possession has been attained). Not only that, but landlords legal protection insurance is included as standard with our rent guarantee insurance too, so you can enjoy all round peace of mind that your legal costs are covered (up to £50,000 per incident), at what we believe is a very competitive price. Important: To enjoy the benefits of a rent guarantee policy you must obtain one Credit Agency Reference (from a reputable Credit Reference Agency) & at least one satisfactory written character reference for each tenant.
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Magazine
Contents Our products Making some MEES time News flash
Making some MEES time Does the acronym “MEES” or the expanded “Minimum Energy Efficient Standards” mean anything to you? If they’ve both drawn a blank, then you may have cause for concern.
MEES
If you’re in the dark about the above, you’re far from alone. Some recent surveys have indicated some pretty worrying statistics:
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round two-thirds of A landlords are hazy about what this is and how it will affect their business; about 25% know nothing at all about MEES.
A full breakdown of the worrying statistics is given in the reference link above and what’s really of concern is that MEES isn’t just another piece of red tape or a minor administrative task. If you get it wrong it could easily stop your business in its tracks. So, it will pay to get to grips with this – and fast.
What is MEES?
Over many years now successive governments have launched major initiatives, backed up by legislation, all aimed at reducing the country’s energy consumption. They have been driven partly by environmental concerns but also by the hard fact that our civilization’s
ever-growing energy demands look unlikely to be met in the future. Given declining fossil fuel levels and the uncertainty over the practicality of nuclear and alternative Green energies, it looks possible that we’ll have a very real gap between demand and supply capabilities in the future. So while a scientific breakthrough in energy generation might be hoped for, in the meantime, the only viable route looks to be trying to consume less energy. MEES is one such initiative. It’s aimed specifically at landlords and let properties. In a nutshell, it will make it illegal to let a property after 1st April 2018 unless it meets certain minimum energy efficiency criteria. That’s the now broadly familiar letter designation that’s allocated after a survey on an Energy Performance Certificate or EPC. If your property is graded in the F or G bands, then from April 2018 you won’t be able to let it unless you’re granted a special exemption. A failure to comply with the regulation could result in a penalty of up to 20% of the rateable value of the property after three months.
Implications
At Cover4LetProperty, we’re expert in things such as landlord insurance rather than building technology and its associated costs. Even so, it’s clear that these changes in regulations might have a serious impact on some landlords. Certain of them may feel they’re trapped between the need to keep letting their property and the difficulty of finding the money required to upgrade their property to a higher energy efficiency rating. Some energy saving
measures can typically be implemented quickly and at modest cost. Examples such as draught excluders come to mind. However, other required work can be more expensive, such as fitting double glazing. Fortunately, there is at least some assistance which might be available in the shape of the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) scheme. This is where the energy supply companies assist by installing insulation and other related assistance either free of charge or at reduced rates.
Conclusion
Whatever the impact of MEES will be on your business, ignoring it wouldn’t be advisable. It will affect very large numbers of landlord properties and those changes will need to be understood and above all managed, if potential fines are to be avoided or your business effectively stopped. Finding some time to get to grips with MEES and what it will mean to you, might be advisable – and perhaps sooner rather than later.
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Magazine
Contents
News flash!
Here is a round of up the latest landlords’ news that you may have missed.
Our products Making some MEES time News flash
Newport landlord fined in first rent smart case
Where can landlords achieve the best buy-to-let yields?
Right-to-Rent: Landlords falling foul of immigration checks
Following the introduction of the Rent Smart regulations that came in to effect in Wales in November 2016, a property owner from Newport has become the first to be prosecuted for breaching the new laws.
According to the latest Your Move Buy-to-Let index in the (year to April 2017), landlords seeking the highest buy-to-let yields in England and Wales may wish to consider buying property in the North East.
Figures recently released by the Press Association reveal that financial penalties totalling £37,000 were handed out over a period of eight months to landlords after the roll-out of the Right-to-Rent checks scheme.
Robert Ivor Grovell pleaded guilty to breaking the new regulations which require that private landlords in Wales must be licensed and was ordered to pay a total of £5,400 in fines and costs.
The study shows that in the year to April 2017:
The introduction of checks in England became law on 1st February 2016 and, says LandlordZone, the property website, the fines are beginning to stack-up against landlords who failed to follow the new rules.
Grovell, from Llanfrechfa, Cwmbran, also admitted operating a dangerous multiple occupancy house. Following an inspection of the property in Orchard Street by Newport council, it was discovered that a fire escape route was blocked, and the house did not have a licence for multiple occupants. Magistrates were told that Grovell was registered as a landlord but had not applied for a licence from Rent Smart Wales. Rent Smart Wales is the new all-Wales body that ensures landlords and agents comply with Welsh housing laws in the private rented sector.
l l andlords in the North East typically received a rental yield of 5.2% l those investing in the North West of England had the second highest return at an average of 5% l overall yields are falling in England and Wales, down from 4.5% in March to 4.4% in April. l in the East Midlands the average yield dropped from 4.4% to 4.1% between March and April, the biggest change recorded by the survey. l in London, the cost of renting property dropped for a fifth month in a row in April l yields in London were the lowest at 3.2%, followed by the South West at 3.3% and the South East at 3.4%. TO LET
Contact us Visit: www.cover4letproperty.co.uk Email: cover4letproperty@alanblunden.co.uk Call: 0800 9707 172 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cover4letproperty
The fines listed and released to-date were issued to 62 landlords between the start of February and end of September last year. Failure to comply with the rules on this can lead to fines of up to £3,000 per tenant, and where it can be shown that someone knowingly rents to people with no right to reside, they face up to five years in prison. It is important to note that most credit reference agencies doing tenant checks include a Right-to-Rent check in their assessment, but this does not absolve the landlord or agent from the need to carefully check the original documents. To find out more, visit the Gov.uk website: https://www. gov.uk/check-tenant-right-to-rent-documents
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