Greed pays price as thousands of Olympics lets lie empty

Tuesday 24th July 2012

Greedy landlords who got rid of perfectly good tenants in order to achieve inflated rents from Olympic visitors have been left bitterly disappointed, and now face substantial voids.

Agents say only a tiny proportion of homes offered for rent for the Olympics have been taken. In Stratford, there are still 300 short let Olympic properties available, from £4,000 to £6,500 a week – in an area where the normal going rate is £1,700 a month.

According to one agent, trying to cash in on the Olympics market has been ‘a total waste of time’. His Chelsea-based business, Champions, has achieved just one Olympics let.

At Stratford, Keatons say that out of 400 landlords offering properties as Olympics lets, just two dozen were successful.

The Foxtons website still has a dedicated Olympics lettings section, showing over 2,000 unlet properties apparently still available for ‘summer 2012 rental’. The most expensive is a six-bedroom boat moored at Canary Wharf available for £60,000 a week. The cheapest is a two-bed flat in Islington at a mere £750 a week.

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