The Rettie Blog

Background – A New Deal for Tenants … The Government are moving forward with rent control proposals, this includes controlling rents in between tenancies so properties will never be able to revert to the market rate.

The Build to Rent (BTR) sector is growing in Scotland, providing professional managed private rented accommodation funded by institutional investors. There are now close to 17,000 homes operating or in the pipeline across the country. Rettie have produced individual reports, providing the latest updates on BTR delivery in each of Scotland’s main cities.

The detail of the Scottish Government's proposals for the Cost of Living (Tenant Protection) (Scotland) Act 2022 beyond 31 March have today (19th January 2023) been released.

We are very pleased to announce that Canopy & Zero Deposit have announced a collaboration to provide deposit replacement to its agent community, starting with Rettie At Rettie we already use Canopy's RentPassport, and will now be adding Zero Deposit's deposit replacement alternative.

The UKAA, the membership organisation for the UK Build to Rent (BTR) sector is urging newly elected Scottish Councils to embrace investment in build to rent and co-living to help address the current housing crisis, addressing nationwide shortages of rental stock and providing additional housing supply to help meet housing targets.

The Scottish Build to Rent sector is continuing to grow, find out how Rettie are involved.

Gillian Mclees, Director of Build To Rent (BTR) services at Rettie, has been appointed as Chair of UKAA Scotland. This accalode will see Gillian chair the organisation's first event in Scotland, taking place in Glasgow this February. “I am delighted to be appointed Chair of the Scotland UKAA.

With all eyes on the BTR sector, having shown its resilience in face of economic turmoil, there are other key consideration now moving up the agenda. Central amongst these considerations, and heavily discussed at the recent BTR London forum, was the role of Environment, Social and Governance (ESG).

While there has been much future gazing over the long-term outlook for different property classes - with questions over the viability of the high street, office space requirement, and growing interest in conversion to residential - there have been more pressing short-term practicalities to address as lockdown has lifted.

Against a backdrop of challenging times for the property sector, many of the qualities of the Build to Rent (BTR) delivery model, and service-led rental offering, have emerged as advantageous.

Rettie has become the first company in Scotland to put its dedicated BTR team through the Institute of Property Management’s (IRPM) Build to Rent (BTR) qualification.

Edinburgh's Harbour Gateway, Scotland's best example of Build to Rent, welcomes its final residents at the end of May in the largest BTR project of its kind in Scotland. Harbour Gateway is the latest phase of the Western Harbour managed rent community, with 234 mid-market homes delivered by Forth Ports partnership with Rettie.