Month: September 2020

Despite COVID-19, searches for SpareRoom have increased by 54.9% since March 2020. With remote working taking over the capital, finding the perfect flatmate has never been more crucial – after all, you’re likely to be spending 24/7 with them whilst working from home!

In this study, CIA Landlord has identified the most desired roommate traits in London by analysing SpareRoom data to reveal the most popular adverts by age, gender, job title and even preferences including LGBT friendly, smoker friendly and pet friendly.

So where are you best suited to find your ideal flatmate in London? Take a look at the findings below:

Marketing, Teaching, Media and Engineering Revealed as the Most Desired Professions for a Flatmate in London

With over 1,174 advertised listings, Marketing professionals officially have the most attractive job titles for flatmates, followed by Teachers (1031 listings), Media professionals (818 listings) and Engineers (790 listings).

London’s Top 5 Most Desired Job Titles for Flatmates

Healthcare workers, Journalists, Accountants, Data professionals and Recruiters have the least attractive job titles for flatmates, with the number of advertised flatmate listings combined for these 5 professions reaching the same number of listings as just marketing professionals alone.

London’s Top 5 Least Desired Job Titles for Flatmates

Waltham Forest Is the Most LGBT+ Friendly Borough for Flatmates, Followed by Lambeth and Hackney

At just a short 30-minute journey into central London, Waltham Forest has been dubbed the most LGBT+ friendly borough for roommates, with over 17.56% of all LGBT+ room wanted listings in London based in the area. Lambeth follows in second, having elected the UK’s first openly HIV+ mayor in April 2020, the borough’s various involvements in supporting the community stays true to its citizens – with over 14.58% of all of London’s LGBT+ house listings featured in the area.

Richmond Upon Thames Is the Least LGBT+ Friendly Borough for Flatmates in London

Amongst the most affluent areas in London, there are 0 listings for LGBT-friendly households in Richmond upon Thames, Barnet, Havering, Bexley and Hillingdon – suggesting a lacking culture or community for the LGBT+ community.

Hackney Has the Most Smoker & Pet-Friendly Flatmates in London, Followed by Waltham Forest and Islington

If you’re looking for the most easy-going neighbours and flatmates in London, head to Hackney where the area ranks first for smoker and pet-friendliness. For most landlords and flatmates opposed to smoking, head to Havering where just 8 out of 7,751 rooms wanted listings specifying smoker-friendly properties.

Top 10 Best London Boroughs for Smoker-Friendly Flatmates

All relatively central Zone 1 / 2 boroughs, Hackney, Waltham Forest, Islington, Lambeth and Newham all have the most easy-going flatmates with regards to smoking, and with plenty of options at over 500+ house listings in the top 5 boroughs.

Top 10 Worst London Boroughs for Smoker-Friendly Flatmates

Havering, Bexley and Enfield all have a low number of advertised smoker-friendly flatmates however in comparison to the number of room wanted listings in the area (24 for Havering, 29 for Bexley, 186 for Enfield) the ratio of smoker-friendly homes is relatively high, suggesting that if you’d like to find smoker-friendly flatmates in this area, there is still the opportunity to!

Top 10 Best London Boroughs for Pet-Friendly Flatmates

Top 10 Worst London Boroughs for Pet-Friendly Flatmates

If you’re not keen on pets, house hunt in Bexley where 0 listings out of over 1000 pet-friendly house listings in London accept pets. Havering, Hillingdon and Barnet follow closely behind with less than 10 pet-friendly properties across these boroughs.

Islington Revealed as the Most Inclusive Borough for Flatmates of All Ages

Whether you’re looking for a professional, student or even ex-pat type flat – there’s a room for all ages in Islington. With over 695 flatmate adverts in the borough alone, 25-34 year olds were the most common age cohort for the borough, followed by 35-44-year-olds, and 18-24-year-olds.

Top 10 London Boroughs for 18 to 24-Year-Old Flatmates

Top 10 London Boroughs for 25 to 34-Year-Old Flatmates

Top 10 London Boroughs for 35 to 44-Year-Old Flatmates

Top 10 London Boroughs for 45 to 54-Year-Old Flatmates

Top 10 London Boroughs for 55+-Year-Old Flatmates

Sources and Methodology

Research conducted 02/09/20 – 07/09/20.

To find the most desired and least desired roommate traits, we analysed SpareRoom data to reveal the most commonly advertised professions, ages and preferences throughout London.

Job titles have been searched as keywords exactly as listed in SpareRoom. This may result in the exclusion of keyword listings where the title was similar but not the same due to the functionality of the source’s search.

Each option point has been treated individually. Where data has been combined to show the “worst” combination of traits, this has been done on an index basis rather than using each as an individual search.

e.g. No searches have been performed for homes that are “LGBT friendly with pets and smokers allowed”. Instead, individual searches have been performed for LGBT, pets, and smokers, and these are combined into a single index to show the least desirable combination.

• www.spareroom.co.uk

Notes to Editors:

If you’re interested in covering our study, we only ask you to please refer back to this study with a link to this post.

PR contact: sarah.fleming@kaizen.co.uk

Even the most beautiful homes can be a struggle to sell or rent if they look lacklustre upon first impression.

When selling a home, it’s not enough to just clear out any clutter and clean; you have to stage it correctly to entice viewers and beat the competition.

A new study by CIA Landlord has found the top items and features for making your home Selling Sunset worthy to viewers.

Here, we reveal the most cost-effective items to buy that add merit to your space based on value combined with popularity by search volume and instagramability. We also showcase the best free ways to revamp a space as well as what red flags to look for when viewing a property.

These 10 Simple, Cheap Finishing Touches Can Increase Your Home’s Value by Almost £1000!

Adding these 10 simple items to your home when staging can increase the value by almost £1000. Everyday pieces like plants, candles and books can significantly raise the value of your home to viewers.

While wallpaper is more of an investment, it can completely transform the look of a room and light and neutral tones can even make the space look bigger and increase the market value by £800.

Books and candles are great options to make a space feel more homely while increasing its value. Placing books on the shelves or cookbooks in the kitchen can give a lived-in feel to an interior while candles add warm lighting and pleasant smells to a home.

A quick grocery shop can even boost the staging value of your home. Fresh vegetables in the kitchen create a wholesome and country-style atmosphere and small decorative jars filled with sweets are a great addition that can also be offered to viewers of the flat.

The top staging items include:

Plants Are the Most Cost-Effective Finishing Touch to Use to Stage Your Home, Increasing the Value of Your Home by £17 per Plant!

Adding plants and seasonal flowers is the best way to enhance a house for staging. Starting from just £3, flowers that are in season are a cost-effective option to add £17.02 of value to a room and introduce a natural aroma. You can style them in bouquets, or in numerous small vases adding pops of colour to compliment simple decor with warmth and a sense of life and nature.

To reveal the most picturesque plants to include when staging your home, we combined the cost vs. instagramability to reveal the top plants to use in staging.

When considering which plant to use in staging, succulents are the cheapest and most popular option, as well as the easiest plant to maintain. If you’re more of a plant fiend and don’t mind the investment, then a fiddle leaf fig is a beautiful choice and one of the most popular plants you can find.

These Are the 10 Cheapest Ways to Boost the Staging Value of Your Home

As well as purchasing new items, there are numerous free ways you can boost the value of your home. One of the most important aspects of presenting a home is ensuring it’s clutter-free. Ally Dowsing-Reynolds, co-owner at Dowsing & Reynolds recommends…

It’s also important to give the space a deep clean, all the way into deep corners and behind furniture and have all surfaces and appliances looking spotless. You should aim to have everything looking close to new or pristine conditions so buyers feel confident in the condition of the property.

Finally, when staging a home you should think about emotion and what atmosphere you want to portray.

The cheapest ways to add flair to home staging include:

Blinds, Artificial Air Fresheners and Fresh Paint Stains Are Some of the LEAST Desirable Features to Add When Staging a Home to Potential Buyers

While blinds can brighten up a room and prevent too much glare from the sun, closed blinds can indicate to viewers that it may be concealing an unsightly view. Similarly, random fresh paint can pose a red flag to viewers. A room with only one wall or a small portion of the ceiling that has been freshly painted suggests the stains are from a prior problem that has not been corrected.

Instead of purchasing exotic or out-of-season flowers, a popular and much more affordable option is to choose flowers and plants which are in season. Likewise, while history books are a great way to add culture into a space, choosing fashion books and magazines instead can significantly increase your home’s staging value.

A cluttered coffee table or too many decorative items can also be off-putting to potential buyers. “When staging a home, the worst thing you can do is overcrowd or clutter rooms and areas” comments Alex Willcocks, owner of Burbeck Interiors comments “home staging isn’t about quantity, it’s about quality. This retracts from the space, and the potential it has. Home staging is all about selling the potential buyer a vision, and this vision needs to be incredibly appealing.”

The least-cost effective features to add to home staging are:

Chanel Inspires the Top Fashion Books for Staging in a Home

Fashion books are a perfect way to add a stylish flair to your living room or bookshelves. The top books people like to see include The World According to Karl, Chanel: Collections and Creations and The Vanity Fair Diaries: 1983 – 1992. Dior Couture is more of a price option at £50 but is the most popular book you can purchase to spruce up space.

The top fashion books for staging include:

Vogue Is the Top Fashion Magazine for Staging Home Staging, Followed by Cosmopolitan and Elle!

Magazines are one of the most popular ways to dress up a simple coffee table. Propped beside a candle and decorative tray, we recommend Vogue, Cosmopolitan and ELLE as the most sought-after and cost-effective issues to display in your home

The other top magazines include:

These Are the Top Hand-washes to Use When Home Staging

Our bathrooms and en-suites are filled with toiletries, lotions and moistures of all types. These are essential items that add a touch of glamour to a room while providing an atmosphere which encourages self-care. Sanctuary Spa hand wash is the most popular soap to include in staging homes and costs just £2 for a bottle. If you choose to go down a pricier route then Neal’s Yard Remedies Geranium and Orange Hand Wash are one of the most loved on the market.

The top hand-washes to include when staging are:

Alex Willcocks, owner of Burbeck Interiors comments, “It is incredibly important for potential buyers to be able to move freely around the property and feel the space, without being impeded by the volume of furniture. The furniture is simply there as an attraction, rather than a selling point. It is used to highlight the space and property, not the other way round. As such we focus on quality high-value items such as sofas, rugs, headboards and feature chairs. We select particular items that can express Burbeck’s style through their textures and colours. Artwork and accessories also feature highly when adding value.”

Methodology

The top staging features were selected by search volume data using Ahrefs and analysing the costs associated with each feature, as well as Instagram hashtags to create a combined score of the most cost-effective staging items.

Notes to Editors

If you’re interested in covering our study, we only ask you to please refer back to this study with a link to this post.

PR contact: ailbhe.hanratty@kaizen.co.uk

Amongst the stamp duty holiday buying frenzy pushing house prices to an all-time high across the UK, where are the most profitable buy-to-let hotspots for landlords looking to invest?

In this study, CIA Landlord reveals the cities with the cheapest average house prices compared to the average rental cost to uncover the best cities and house types to invest in before stamp duty holiday ends in March 2021.

Take a look at the top cities here:

Top 25 Buy-to-Let Cities Under Stamp Duty Holiday

Salford Ranks As The Best UK City For Landlords Buying-To-Let!

For landlords looking to buy a new property with a means to let out, our study shows Salford to be the best city in the UK. With an average house price of £173,311, properties are affordable in the area and as average rent prices are in the region of £1,052 per month, it proves to be extremely profitable too. With the stamp duty holiday announced in the UK, you can also be looking to save almost £1,000  when purchasing a property here!

Conveniently, close to Salford, Manchester ranks as the second-best city for buy-to-let hotspots for landlords. House prices average out at an affordable £193,681, and with rental incomes averaging £1,141, you can also expect to save £1,373 in stamp duty savings! Leeds, Portsmouth and Belfast follow closely behind with house prices ranging between an affordable budget of £100k-£250k with rental income reaching over £2,000 per month!

The Top 10 Cities For Landlords Buying-to-Let

High Wycombe Ranks As The Worst UK City For Buy-to-Let Property Buyers!

High Wycombe ranked as the worst city for those looking to buy a house with the aim of letting. With average prices hitting £430,891, the area is certainly an expensive one. With rent prices averaging a comparatively low £945 per month, the profitability margin is very low, meaning it’s worth avoiding the city if possible.

Despite being known as one of the most beautiful cities in the UK, Cambridge isn’t a city you would want to invest cash in either – with house prices averaging £448,432 whereas rental income averages a mere £1,080. The UK cities you should also avoid investing in include Reading, Worcester and Watford, all cities have low rental incomes compared to house price averages which almost reach £500,000!

The 10 Worst Cities For Landlords Buying-to-Let

Havering Ranks as the Best London Borough For Buy-to-Let Property Buyers!

For those living in London, buying a property can seem like an extremely unattainable dream with the average price tag for a home in the capital commonly topping the million-pound mark. However, with remote working taking over the capital, there are actually 13 boroughs where average houses prices fall below the £500,000 mark, allowing for an attractive pot of stamp duty savings too, within an area that is a perfect commutable distance into the city.

The study revealed that Havering was the best borough for profitability, with house prices averaging at £395,832 and monthly rental prices reaching a high £1,895. Under the stamp duty holiday, you can also expect to save more than £9,000 when buying the property!

Newham, Barking & Dagenham and Enfield follow Havering, with house prices averaging between £300k-£400k. With the average monthly rent price for all the top London boroughs surpassing £1,000 per month, landlords in the capital that look to invest further out of zones 1-3 will certainly reap the rewards.

The Top London Boroughs for Landlords Buying-to-Let

Kensington and Chelsea Ranks as the Least Sensible Buy-to-Let Hotspot for Stamp Duty Savings

With average house prices reaching over £2 million, Kensington and Chelsea (5.46 out of 10) ranks as the least sensible buy-to-let hotspot amongst the current stamp duty holiday. Whilst just as profitable as Bexley (5.47 out of 10) or Waltham Forest (also 5.47 out of 10) why not avoid the hefty price tag and opt for a borough that returns the exact same in proportional investment at just a fraction of the price?

Bromley, Haringey and Ealing follow as the second, third and fourth-least business-savvy options with the exact same profitability ROI as Barking & Dagenham (£302,060) or Enfield (£399,517).

This being said, if you a couple million spare to invest and are just looking for the most profitable borough disregarding stamp duty savings, Westminster, with a profitability score of 8.04 out of 10 is your best bet. This is followed by Southwark, Lambeth, Brent, Wandsworth, Hammersmith, Barnet and Camden, where no other borough below £500,000 comes near these areas’ return on investment margin (scores ranging from 6.56 to 8.04 out of 10).

The Least Sensible London Boroughs for Landlords Buying-to-Let Under Stamp Duty Holiday

The Most Profitable Buy-to-Let Hotspots Based on House Size

If you’re a landlord looking to invest in a specific house type for families, couples, professionals or students, the study also revealed the best areas to invest in based on the number of bedrooms you’re looking to buy:

• Grimsby ranks as the best city for those looking to buy and let a one-bedroom-sized house – costing just £81,338 with rent at £375 on average

• Sunderland ranks as the best city for those looking to buy and let a two-bedroom-sized house – costing just £105,818 with rent at £531 on average

• Grimsby also ranks as the best city for those looking to buy and let a three-bedroom-sized house – costing £125,768 with rent at £490 on average

• Doncaster ranks as the best city for those looking to buy a four-bedroom-sized house – costing £252,710 with rent at £547 on average

• Doncaster also ranks as the best city for those looking to buy a five-bedroom-sized house – costing £274,995 with rent at £457 on average

Sources and Methodology

In order to calculate the best cities for buy-to-lets under the government’s latest stamp duty holiday, we analysed the average house price, rent price and stamp duty savings in every UK city for the cheapest home prices with the highest rental yield in order to calculate profitability. We also examined the average rent and house price by the number of bedrooms across the UK to reveal the most profitable areas by home type.

• https://www.rightmove.co.uk

• https://www.zoopla.co.uk

• https://www.home.co.uk

• https://www.knightfrank.co.uk

Notes to Editors

If you’re interested in covering our study, we only ask you to please refer back to this study with a link to this post.

PR contact: alex.fiske@kaizen.co.uk