Desperation is the father of invention, but in the case of London’s hypercompetitive rental market, tenants are going old school.
The result is truly bizarre bidding wars, replete with love letters, headshots, chocolates and flowers from tenants hoping to woo landlords, the Wall Street Journal reports. The weirdness emerging from London’s rental market mimics an old-fashioned courtship, “Bridgerton” style.
“When the phone started blowing up I actually considered pulling the plug out of the line,” real-estate agent James Dainton told the publication. “I said to the team, ‘How do we actually deal with 70 to 80 applicants?’ We try to be as fair as we can, but at the same time when you’ve got that many inquiries, you’ve got to be a little bit cutthroat.”
Paying months of rent in advance and cosigners have become commonplace for renting Londoners searching for a new home. In a market like that, it’s not just money that talks. The increased competition means landlords looking at more than bank accounts to determine if an applicant is a good fit, the outlet reported.
Personal statements akin to love letters, with long descriptions about renters’ hobbies, interests, romantic lives and athletic pursuits, are now ubiquitous.
“It’s like an audition,” Oliver Cruikshank, a director at Keatons, told the outlet. “Personality can come into it. If the landlord feels they connect with the tenant they may decide on that.”
Hopeful applicants have arrived at showings with flowers and chocolates to help their efforts. Bidding wars are frequent, but agents told the outlet intangibles like personality have swayed landlords preferring “fit” over cash.
London’s rental market tightened like a corset after pandemic sales took many flats off the market, followed by a flood of workers and students returning to the city, according to the outlet. When supply goes down, prices must go up. And up they went –– by 49 percent from pandemic rent’s lowest point in April 2021, according to Knight Frank data. The jump marks the second highest post-pandemic rent growth rate in the world, second only to New York City.
Bidding wars have boomed in recent years, with the pandemic flipping many markets on their heads. New York, Chicago and Atlanta saw bidding wars for rentals last year. The rental market in the sunbelt was also ablaze last year, with rents in hot spots like Austin going for 35 percent over the listed rent.
— Kate Hinsche