x

David dOrton-Gibson

Training for Professionals MD

6375 Profile Views

About Me

.

my expertise in the industry

over 30 years

David's Recent Activity

We surveyed 95,000 section 21 notices before lockdown and the vast majority, over 80%, had the option of using section 8 but chose to use section 21. Now with section 24 tax changes fully in force, negative capital gains changes, loss of section 21 getting closer, landlords are leaving the market (a reason Shelter fails to mention when saying landlords want to cash in on higher rents). The real problem is that we are simply not building enough properties to satisfy demand in either social, private rented or owner occupied markets. All this on top of the fact that 2022 was probably still people playing catch up after not evicting tenants during the pandemic. Oh, landlords also leaving the market due to the impending costs of energy efficiency upgrades, current proposal up to £10,000 per property. With increased interest rates and these costs some will be leaving as they cannot afford to stay.

From: David dOrton-Gibson 13 February 2023 08:52 AM

Although not talked about here or in the consultation for the PRS, but the plan is for all homes to be carbon neutral by 2050. We only tend to read about the PRS side (and don't forget everything you read will apply to your office. If you want to see the road map search for the heat and building strategy which maps it all out across all sectors. For example, mortgage lenders are going to have targets for improving their average EPC rating for building they are lending on. This will result in them offering loans to add to the borrowing and increasing the mortgage rate on poorly performing properties. This will result in better performing properties increasing in value faster than lower EPC ratings which lenders won't want on their books. I note the strategy also aims to reduce the cost of a heat pump by between 25 and 50% in the next few years, hence the cash incentive to adopt early.

From: David dOrton-Gibson 20 October 2021 13:06 PM

I have looked at a bore hole ground source heat pump for my bungalow and it looks like about £25-30K. Not something you can reasonably expect landlords to find. The current plans include making insulation etc the first thing (fabric first approach) and other technology later. There is no question insulation is key. Comment above mentions larger radiators, heat pumps generally only provide water at about 40 degrees (as opposed to 60-80 degrees easily for your gas boiler). This will cause problems for existing radiators. We have installed underfloor heating which works fine but is another cost. What is not mentioned above is the cost of running it. An air source heat pump will produce about 2-3Kwh of heat for each Kwh of electricity put in (making it much more efficient than any form of electric heating). Ground source heat pumps can run 4-5 Kwh per Kwh of electricity so are more efficient still. Whilst air source pumps can happy operate in sub zero temperatures, as temperature falls the efficiency falls so in cold weather you can expect the lower end of the efficiency range, this is a major benefit of ground source which is pretty much constant. Her is the catch, I currently pay 16 pence per Kwh for electric and 2.9 pence per Kwh on gas. Therefore even if I got an efficiency of the ideal 5 times, it is still costing slightly more than gas. At a cold weather 2 times efficiency I would be paying 16 pence in electric compared to 6 pence for gas. Tenant's are going to notice that. Will they come in? I think they will undoubtedly. Higher gas prices make them more attractive. To address another point, is this new technology? Only in so far as you would consider a fridge or air conditioning unit "new technology" as this is exactly how they work. I do expect them to improve as there is greater focus and pressure on their use but it is probably one of the most prolific technologies, basically found in every home. Added 1124 Forgot to say I would not be surprised to see overnight electricity price increase, making economy 7 type tariffs less attractive. Why might it increase, supply and demand. As we use more electric cars there will more of them set to charge overnight creating more demand meaning supplies will not have to sell night time electricity so cheaply, yet another factor in an already complex market!

From: David dOrton-Gibson 20 October 2021 11:07 AM

Breaking News