The average annual void period has fallen to its lowest level since 2002, according to the latest research from Paragon Mortgages.
Over the past 13 years the specialist buy-to-let mortgage lender has surveyed a panel of landlord customers. The average void period (the length of time between one lot of tenants moving out and a new lot of tenants moving in) reported in Q1 2015 – 2.4 weeks – was the lowest since the survey came into being.
The average void period in the last quarter of 2014 was 2.6 weeks. When comparing the first quarter of this year against the first quarter of 2014, the amount of time a landlord has experienced a void has dropped by 14% from 2.8 weeks.
Since 2013, landlords have been recording low or dwindling void periods, with only a small fluctuation in mid-2013 when the average moved up slightly to three weeks.
“Void periods have been consistently low for some time, which is not unexpected when you also look at what landlords are telling us about the level of demand from tenants,” John Heron, Managing Director at Paragon Mortgages, said. “In our survey for the first quarter of 2015, 42% of landlords said in their view tenant demand was either growing or booming and 54% felt demand was stable.”
The housing market, Heron added, is undergoing a shift, with more people choosing to live in the Private Rented Sector (PRS) thanks to high house prices and a shortage of available housing stock.
“This is supported by the figures released this month by the English Housing Survey which show 4.4 million households are now privately rented, compared with 3.9 million households in the social rented sector,” Heron concluded. “This change in housing dynamics appears to be a continuing and long-term trend.”
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