In a week where the City has been buoyed by slightly better CPI figures, property investors with an interest in landlord insurance have received both positive and negative news about their industry.
As a comparatively new face in the lending business launches a clutch of short term loans designed especially for landlords, research shows tenant arrears are at their highest since 2008.
Shawbrook Bank, which launched only twelve months ago, are hoping to woo buy-to-let landlords with a range of short term loans. They include a loan for landlords looking to buy, refurbish or release equity from the after works value of a property, and short term loans for those landlords who are looking to add to their portfolio by buying a property at an auction.
The bank will also offer short term loans for any landlord looking to carry out small refurbishments to a property. The bank is still a relatively new lender but they have already seen high demand for their products which offer competitive pricing and fee structures.
Stephen Johnson, managing director of commercial lending at Shawbrook Bank, said “Our appetite to lend to professional investors is strong, and we’re constantly looking at ways to improve our products and processes to meet the needs of our brokers and clients.”
The bad news is that the growth in the number of tenants in arrears increased by 1.6% in the third quarter of 2012. There are now 99,000 tenants in arrears of at least two-months and this is 15% more than this time last year. Tenants in severe arrears represent 2.5% of tenancies in England and Wales and despite the steady growth in severe tenant arrears so far this year, there was a reduction in the number of private tenants who were evicted through court orders. On an annual basis, cases of buy to let mortgages more than three months in arrears fell by 21%.