Generation Rent says tenants amongst hardest hit by energy hike

The hardest hit will be those with any form of electric heating, often 1 or 2 bed properties, with young or low wage occupiers. The green & social levies, loaded disproportionately onto electricity bills, have pushed prices up to sky-high levels and electric only customers are already paying much more in cash terms than gas customers for their heating. The 54% increase will result in much bigger £ rises for them, despite the fact that they use the greener fuel. This is a scandal & should be resolved by removing the green levies on household bills immediately.

We are trying to get to NetZero too quickly & the cost is too high.

Tenants will also be a facing higher rents.
If the Government and Councils carry on as they are Tenants will not have to worry about Gas and Electricity bills . They will not have a rental home to keep warm

I currently include gas, electric, water, broadband and Council Tax in all of my HMOs.

I have never increased rents for existing HMO tenants as long as they keep the same room. Some of my tenants have been asking if there will be rent increases due to the increased utility costs and one group have very sweetly said they would be willing to pay towards the utility price rises if I was struggling as they don't want to have to move house. Right now I'm adopting a wait and see approach for existing tenants but making sure they are aware how much the rent is for similar newly available rooms. In several cases my current tenants are paying around £50 a month less than the current market rent for their rooms would be. So in terms of what happens with the Council Tax rebate (which in my HMOs amounts to between 48p and 72p per person per week) not increasing the rent for the time being more than absorbs that. The £200 is a loan anyway. I should be OK with the above until next autumn but may need a change of policy if the October price cap is massive.

Student houses are a different matter as we are working 18 months in advance. My crystal ball simply isn't that good.
From September I'm only including gas in 2 of my student houses that are let on a joint tenancy agreement. Most student houses in this area haven't got any bills included. My reasoning is that I hate to think of tenants being cold, the house is less likely to get mouldy if it is properly heated and they might even open windows occasionally, if they try to use less water they automatically use less gas, broadband companies are a nightmare for me to deal with as they will only speak to the bill payer not the person who is experiencing the problem, electric is where the usage can be most unpredictable. I've seen too many fan heaters (because they can't be bothered to walk downstairs and boost the central heating), too many part loads of washing, the tumble drier used for just a couple of items, too many table or floor standing lamps with old fashion bulbs left on all day, etc.

The thing that would be most useful at the moment would be for our credit balances from the previous utility providers to be refunded. I had some back quite quickly but haven't had the balances from PFP, Neon Reef or Green.

As said above by Stephen..... the real danger is the soon to come rent increases and possible eviction if the EPC C comes in, it will make mute the issue we currently have with energy.

For a lot of the lower end tenants these increases won't affect them as rental properties disappear from the market, it's free to sleep in a shop door way, if Generation rant want some one to blame they had better be looking at themselves, shelter and governments

Stop moaning Generation Rent. Maybe they should financially support the needy rather than just talking about it.

Why do Generation Rent and the like, presume it will be ‘private renters’ suffering the brunt of the energy hikes? Oh, I forgot - the poorly insulated, inefficient homes we ‘Private Rental Sector Landlords’ provide are hovels. Strange that, despite the substandard homes we apparently provide, tenants happily choose to live in them long term! So the PRS Landlord bashing continues ……….

Whole net zero carbon tax climate change is one big con , designed to make everyone equal, equally poor

Social housing tenants with communal heating and hot water are already paying higher costs as the price cap doesn’t apply in these circumstances.

Busy today didn’t have time to change my mind. Green Home Grant in London a bit of a non starter the way I read it. Suppose to be £26m between 13 L’don Boroughs going to improve 2500 homes with 66% of a Grant / £5k per property plus LL’s £2.5k making £7.5k total. So even those figures don’t seem to add up / £5k x 2500 = £12’500’000 well £12.5m is not & 26m.
Anyway its not available to working Tenants according to the rules set. The Property household to be eligible has to have an income under £30k pa. Therefore even 2 working Shares on the London minimum wage will be well above this threshold, so its only for Benefit claimants. The Council says they are so excited about this Scheme my goodness it easy to excite them. Perhaps someone can enlighten me I can’t get excited at all.

• Andrew townshend
• 09 February 2022 19:24 PM

My experience of grants are they are a total waste of time even bothering to apply for, 7-8 yrs ago I had a boiler pack up, tenant was a single mum, we applied for a grant, my contribution was to be £1900 paid up front, I purchased a Baxi boiler from Mr Central Heating £700 inc VAT my plumber fitted it (not VAT reg) for £500, so cost me £1200 as apposed to £1900 with the grant, stitch up .

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A waste of time for sure like British Gas who once gave me a Boiler quote £900. over the top,
yes Grants a non starter wasting everyone time and money.

• George Dawes
• 10 February 2022 12:12 PM

They always find excuses like have you read the small print ?

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