News Release
AXA Insurance
PR & Communications Department
AXA Insurance
No3 Atlantic Quay
20 York Street
Glasgow G2 8JH
Study finds surge of financial optimism among tenants in London and the South East
14 September 2016. AXA’s latest survey of British tenants study finds that those in London and the South East are the most confident of their chances of buying. For most, it will be in a different part of the country though. As the region’s tenant population remain young and restless, AXA highlights the need for landlords to work harder to secure stable tenancies.
A quarter of people living in London today rent from private landlords, and private rentals have overtaken social housing as the second biggest provider of homes in the South East. Tenants here expect to be on the rental market for the shortest time; just 6.7 years compared to a national average of almost a decade.
There has been a significant rise in the number of tenants who see buying as a realistic prospect. Those who want to buy but see no prospect of doing so has fallen from 61 per cent in 2013 to 54 per cent this year. The number saving for a deposit has tripled too– to reach twenty per cent in the South East overall, and 31 per cent in London itself.
The study suggests that when tenants buy, they will buy outside of the South East. Seven in ten plan to move to another region of the UK, or overseas (15 per cent), in the next five years.
Shopping around for a better property is an annual event for most tenants in London: nine in ten say they will look at the market again within the next year, mostly seeking a better price-space ratio. With tenants inclined to move fast between rentals in the capital, few can say they know their landlords personally. And a separate study by AXA found that the average landlord visits a London rental property less than once a year.
Darrell Sansom, Managing Director, AXA Business Insurance, comments: “The nature of the tenant population in London is highly transient: many see their stay in the capital as a temporary interlude when they can boost their career and get a foothold onto a higher income bracket. The good news is that more are benefiting financially from being in London than three years ago – if we judge by the numbers saving and expecting to buy, and fewer feel trapped in their rentals.”
“It also means that rental culture in the capital is the most short-term and insecure in Britain. And this revolving door of tenants is the number one headache for landlords as it brings income insecurity, vacant periods, and more wear and tear to the property.”
“In London, this is a situation driven by economics, but there are still things landlords can do to encourage longer stays. Little compromises on things like pets, freebies like broadband or cleaning services, offering to redecorate –can build precious loyalty. As an insurer, we also know that when landlords and tenants get to know each other and aren’t strangers, they have more peace of mind and greater financial security in the long run.”
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Enquiries
Amy Needham, PR & Communications, , 07434804059.
Notes to Editors
*AXA surveyed 1,000 tenants in Great Britain in July 2016, and conducts a quarterly survey of landlords (sample size: 300).
About AXA Business Insurance
AXA Business Insuranceis part of AXA Insurance UK plc, which belongs to the AXA group of companies. With us, you choose the business insurance that’s right for you. We offerpublic liability,employers’ liabilityandprofessional indemnityinsurance online to start ups, sole traders, self-employed people and small businesses. In addition we offervan insuranceandlandlord insurance. AXA Business Insurance also runsBusiness Guardian Angelwhich provides resources to help protect and grow small businesses. You can follow AXA Business Insurance on Twitter @AXAbizteam for business insurance help, and find AXA Business Insurance on Google+ and Facebook – and you can watch expert guides and business case studies on the AXA Business Insurance YouTube channel.
About AXA
The AXA Group is a worldwide leader in insurance and asset management, with 166,000 employees serving 103 million clients in 64 countries. In 2015, IFRS revenues amounted to Euro 99.0 billion and IFRS underlying earnings to Euro 5.6 billion. AXA had Euro 1,363 billion assets under management as of December 31, 2015. In 2015 Interbrand ranked AXA the 1st insurance brand worldwide for the 7th consecutive year.
In the UK AXA operates through a number of business units including: AXA Wealth, AXA Insurance, AXA PPP healthcare, AXA Ireland and an independent distribution business Bluefin. AXA employs over 10,500 staff in the UK.
The AXA ordinary share is listed on compartment A of Euronext Paris under the ticker symbol CS (ISN FR 0000120628 – Bloomberg: CS FP – Reuters: AXAF.PA). AXA’s American Depository Share is also quoted on the OTC QX platform under the ticker symbol AXAHY.
The AXA Group is included in the main international SRI indexes, such as Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) and FTSE4GOOD. It is a founding member of the UN Environment Programme’s Finance Initiative (UNEP FI) Principles for Sustainable Insurance and a signatory of the UN Principles for Responsible Investment.