Would you rent your property out to students?

MyMiniCrib

Hello,

I am about to buy my first buy to let and i was thinking that it will be good to rent out to students by the room as it might end up paying me well, no council tax to pay and renting by the room sometimes mean that the house is never empty (always having a tenant) and i might never have to renovate the entire house at one time.

Its a three bedroom with a living room, i could even convert the living room into a big room and rent that out as well. It has two toilets so it will be two to one.

Please, what are the ups and downs of renting to students?

Many thanks for your help!

NobodysChild

I don't think they're anymore likely to trash the place than any other tenant.

Some LL's I know who rent to students, have 4 and 5 bed BTL houses, and they charge each one £400 a month, and they pay the electric and gas and water rates for them, so this can be very appealing for many students as they don't need to worry about bills (students don't pay council tax!)

So a couple I know get around 2 grand a month! (The gas and electric and water is usually no more than £200 a month in total: often less!) And one lady I know has 3 houses all bought years ago, and paid for, and she actually makes a living out of renting out her house to students.

The worst she gets is complaints about noise from neighbours, but when she has a word about it, they calm down.

So the main advantage is that you could make more money than having one tenant in there, and probably have the rent a bit more guaranteed. My LL friends never struggle to get the rent of their uni students. it's late by a week now and again, but they always pay.

kinger101

The main downside to renting to students is they usually young, somewhat irresponsible, and tend to cause what we might call "accelerated wear and tear". Usually, student properties are at the bottom end of the market in terms of decorative finish for this reason.

Room-by-room rental can be used, but often, a group on students will rent a place and have joint and several liability. If one of them leaves, they are all responsible for the short-fall. Usually, they'll find another tenant themselves anyway within a short amount of time.

Student houses are usually HMOs, so there is extra legislation to comply with. You will also need to let furnished. In the past, I've seen houses with no communal lounge, but this is a rarity (perhaps not even legal now). I'd avoid this, as most students want a lounge. Properties with 2 reception rooms usually have one converted to a bedroom though.

In terms of refurbishing, you can usually do this over the summer when the properties are vacant (for undergraduates anyway). You won't get rent in this period, but usually, you can charge a retainer fee over the summer.

silvercar

Are you near a university?

In my experience (of having had kids who have become students), they want to rent a house as a group of students rather than each finding a room on their own. They also want a furnished property.

Students usually want a room for one year from September, they don't move at other times of the year. So your "never empty" is going to turn to either fully occupied for the year or empty.

Students tend to be less careful with the property, less aware of potential problems, have a heavier wear and tear. On the upside, they are generally less fussy on the standard of furnishings.

ognum

MyMiniCrib wrote: »

Hello,

I am about to buy my first buy to let and i was thinking that it will be good to rent out to students by the room as it might end up paying me well, no council tax to pay and renting by the room sometimes mean that the house is never empty (always having a tenant) and i might never have to renovate the entire house at one time.

Its a three bedroom with a living room, i could even convert the living room into a big room and rent that out as well. It has two toilets so it will be two to one.

Please, what are the ups and downs of renting to students?

Many thanks for your help!

OP, I think you may have this the wrong way round.

What does your business plan say, when buying a property to let out it would be better to have worked out who your potential tenants are are, what you yield is and how you are going to manage your property.

Letting to students requires you to have your property to the standard of an HMO. You need to google this in order to know if you can meet the standards.

You will have voids out of college terms which I believe are getting shorter, some student I know only have term from October to May.

Who is managing the property?

Brallaqueen

Students are high risk high reward. They can drop out of their course and move back home or realise that they are only in two days a week and decide to commute. As they are young they do not always realise the commitment they are signing up to and you can be sure Mum or Dad will back them, not you.

The graduate market is similar but older and have more experience of renting
But as they are still in the early days of a career are still looking at rooms rather than ho ses

flora48

No.
I cannot believe how students choose to live, my own offspring included!

Brallaqueen and Silvercar make some very good points.

My friend had student lets and used to spend each summer doing repairs and decoration.

Loopy28

When I was at uni, I lived in 3 different student houses and we didn't wreck any of them, we all paid our rent on time. Many student lets ask for termly rent in advance, which I think is a good idea as student finance comes in each term so means you know they are paid up in advance for the term.

Only negative was we weren't the best at cleaning but you can say that about any tenant. We ended up sharing the cost of a cleaner post tenancy to bring it up to standard.

That said, I did know two groups of all male students who both trashed their houses, I am talking kicked in doors, beer and fag burns on carpets, rubbish left all over the house, punched walls etc. I know it isn't totally pc but I after seeing what they did to their houses, I would be reluctant to rent to all male students.

fishpond

To answer your question
Many people do, but me, never.

GwylimT

We have a rental property which was rented to university students for years, we rented the property as a whole rather than individual rooms. The only extra thing I used to do was to visit the property during the university holidays if my tenants returned home, this was justf because of increased security risks with an empty property.

We now rent the house out to a family, we only changed as it isn't as convenient for my to do regular visits and families are unlikely to be on holiday for eight or so weeks.

Glover1862

I was thinking of doing this with a BTL in Luton, it's such a a pain, anything over three students and its a HMO, need to pay a fee to the council, £500 I think, change to fire doors, fire lighting and the rooms need to be a certain size, one of mine was just a bit smaller and would mean knocking walls down etc. Don't know where you're think of doing it but Luton is a pain and a think most places are. Oh, mortgages for HMO are a different animal.