If anything has seen a boom and bust in recent years, it is the buy to let insurance market. This has followed the whole buy to let bubble. I remember 25 years ago trying to get my first mortgage and facing many many hurdles. Not only did you have to prove you were a good saver, you had to provide a deposit, around 10%, and have been in permanent employment for a good few years. Then, in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, UK mortgage companies and banks decided that they would start to offer mortgages, effectively to anyone and everything.
The 100% mortgage was born and it really was not that difficult to get yourself on the hitherto unachievable property ladder. This progresses to the buy to let market, when you could easily get finance on properties that you were going to rent out. All you had to do was say what you thought the rental income would be and this was multiplied to give you a mortgage. You still had to get a deposit, but the fact was that anyone could get two, three, four properties, really with no effort.
On the back of this, as a business insurance broker, we saw a boom in the insurance on the properties. They could not be covered on a traditional home policy and as there was effectively an income being received, even though it was going towards a mortgage, it was a business.
Then, in 2007 and 2008 it all went a bit pear shaped. The banks panicked, the markets panicked and the credit crunch entered everyones vocabulary.
This put the brakes on the whole market. Now, in 2011, we are seeing the market increasing. Landlords are reporting rents increasing in excess of 10% per annum, depending on where you are.
If you are dipping your toe in the water or you are an experienced property owner, then you need to speak to Businsessinsure about your landlords insurance. We have many providers and can cover DSS, Students, Asylum Seeker tenants and unoccupied properties.