More pensioners giving up home ownership to rent, claim

The value of rents for new tenancies arranged last month slipped by 4.6% to £815 per month.

Referencing firm Homelet says that despite the fall, the figure is still 2.7% more than in October last year.

Only in Northern Ireland and the north-east did agreed rents of new tenancies go up: in the north-east, the average cost rose 1.4% to £515 per month.

When the Greater London figure is removed, the average cost of renting a home in the UK fell by 3.4% during October 2013 to £672 per month.

 It is currently 90.9% more expensive to rent a home in the capital than the rest of the UK when the Greater London figure is removed. However, rents in London have also fallen in line with most of the rest of the UK: across Greater London, new rents for tenancies agreed last month decreased by 4% to £1,283 per month.

Homelet’s latest survey also notes a rise in the number of retirees moving into a new rented home over the past year, with a 7% rise in the number of tenants aged 66–70 who were formerly home owners.

Peter Lawrence at Lawrence Rand said: “This report shows a continuingly healthy rental market and that many older people are taking the opportunity to realise their property assets in order to better fund their retirement years.”