A ‘perfect storm’ caused by floods of foreign tenants previously held back by Covid lockdowns, has swamped the London lettings market.

That’s the experience of letting agent Tim Hassell, Managing Director of Draker, (main picture) who has witnessed the huge influx first hand.

“It is an extraordinary time, a perfect storm,” he told The Neg. Draker, which operates in west London, normally has between 1,200–1,500 live applications on its books, but currently has 6-7,000.

Enquiries from foreign tenants, especially from Asia and America have increased tenfold this year, he says. Normally the market quietens down in the autumn, but this year the frenzy is set to last into November or December.

Coupled with a lack of lettings supply as landlords leave the market, there is high pressure on each available rental, and prices have returned to 2019 levels.

Now, there are typically more than six offers per property, and often as many as nine, Hassell reports. Many tenants are prepared to pay the rent upfront and will attempt to outbid each other, he says.

New normal

“It is like a swarm of locusts, and we have a butterfly net.”

“It is like a swarm of locusts, and we have a butterfly net,” he says. “This is the new normal, and it will be repeated next year.”

Hassell predicted “a rough couple of years” for tenants as the supply and demand crisis in lettings really bites.

He says the disincentives on landlords have continued with the Renters Reform White Paper, and the “loud voice” of vulnerable tenants causing a disparity.

It is inevitable, he says, that the government will have to redress the balance and change the narrative of being punitive towards landlords.