The Private Rented Sector (PRS) could exceed five million homes by 2025 after almost 20% growth in the past ten years, according to research from Ocasa.
In the past ten years, the nation’s PRS has increased in size by 18.8%, from 4.1 million homes to just shy of 4.9 million.
On a regional level, the fastest growth over this time period has been in the South West, the West Midlands and London where the stock level has increased by 31.2%, 25.4% and 21.7% respectively.
Jack Godby, sales and marketing director at Ocasa, said: “The Government is trying to dampen the PRS by making it less and less cost effective to purchase additional homes for investment purposes such as buy-to-let.
“But there is still a huge need for rented homes in England – not every can or wants to buy their own home.
“Perhaps the new PM’s latest tax incentives will give a boost to the market, but in order to ensure that there are enough good homes for those who need them, more still needs to be done to make buy-to-let more attractive for landlords.”
Based on the historic growth trends above, Ocasa has forecasted how the PRS will perform in the future.
Taking England’s 18.8% growth over the course of a decade, it is calculated that, between today and 2025, dwelling stock totals could increase by a further 6.4%.
This is equivalent to an additional 313,906 homes which will bring the national total to just under 5.2 million.
Regionally, the most new homes are expected to be added to the PRS in London (68,336), the South East (47,500), and North West (38,075).
Meanwhile, the smallest increase in market size is forecast to come from the North East where just 13,291 new homes will be added to the PRS by 2025.
