This week LandlordZONE caught up with Marcus Selmon, Chair of portfolio landlord group PLAN to discuss the state of the private rented sector and the soon-to-be enacted Renters’ Rights Bill from the perspective of his members, who are landlords with 75 Properties or more.

What is PLAN (Portfolio Landlord’s Action Network)?

“PLAN is a group of portfolio landlords who all own more than 75 properties and who manage and operate their portfolios as a proper business on a full-time basis,” he says.

Why did you form PLAN?

“Because I could see that the vast majority of the two million plus landlords own less than five properties as an investment and I wanted to get together with landlords like myself who were operating full time in this business,” he says.

“I believed landlords such as myself would have a very different agenda to those who were purely buy-to-let investors. And that has proved to be the case.”

Do you think the Government tends to ignore portfolio landlords?

“Yes, but as a result of forming PLAN I now understand why,” he says. “From our research we believe there are fewer than 500 Landlords with more than 75 units. Indeed, it could be less than 250.

“Why therefore should the Government take account of us? I believe that they should because larger portfolio landlords are the future of the private rental sector and should be encouraged and promoted.

“Such landlords offer a solution to the problems that the Government faces because if they were encouraged to emerge then you would have entities with the resource to meet the government regulations.

“I should add I am ignoring Build to Rent which is a very different part of the market and which does have the ear of Government but which numerically can only be a very small part of the market.

“Currently they operate 100,000 units which have cost billions of pounds as they are very high end.

“Even if they trebled in size, they would be a small part of a five million unit market and such growth would take years.”

Will the Renters’ Rights Bill make things more difficult and what do your members perceive will be the main challenges?  

“It will make things more difficult. How could it not?  The question is will it make things impossible.,” he says.

“The biggest problem for landlords is until the rules are in place and we see how they operate it is impossible to know what the real challenges will be and how we will cope with them.

“There is huge uncertainty in so many areas about these rules. And in many areas, there are multiple concerns about different aspects of the new system.

“Let me give one example of many. There is massive uncertainty about the whole process of resolving disputes.

“All aspects of this process are unclear. Many of the potential problems we can see do not even appear to have been considered. Here is one that I do not think I have seen mentioned in any commentaries.

“The Government now provides a free solicitor for tenants to represent them in court. If they do so under the new system will the rules allow those solicitors to claim solicitor’s costs on an unrestricted basis?  

“No one can guarantee to win a Section 8 action but if landlords fear that if they lose they will have to pay thousands of pounds of tenant’s solicitors costs as well as their own, at the end of a process that is going to take in total a year or more then that really would be the end for many landlords.

“That is why we always supported the creation of a housing court like in Scotland where solicitor’s costs cannot be claimed and parties are encouraged to represent themselves.  

“All we can do now is wait for the rules to be operational and see in practice what the details are and how they actually impact on the industry.”

If you could make an elevator pitch to Matthew Pennycook what would you want to say to address your members’ concerns?

“We are the most denigrated business group in society.,” he says. “There have been so many hurtful comments made by the well-funded anti-landlord lobbies which go above and beyond criticisms made of any other industry.

“And which seem to be supported by a significant number of MPs. And despite the occasional comment made by the Government I believe they have basically bought into that belief.

“So what I would say is ‘please treat landlords as part of the solution and not part of the problem and work with them to provide a PRS we can be all be proud of.’

“But begin that process by confirming that the Government believes in the PRS as a concept and strongly criticise those who make comments even in their own party such as “landlords do not work for a living.

“We would ask the Government to organise meetings with landlords not just landlord groups to hear what their concerns are and give them the chance to respond directly on those points.”