Private rents 'still rising fast'

14 July 2011 Last updated at 23:01 GMT Rents started to rise last year, LSL said Strong demand for rented properties has pushed private sector rents to an average of ?701 a month across England and Wales, a letting firm has said.

LSL Property Services, which owns letting agencies around the country, said the average rent paid by private tenants rose by 0.7% in June.

Over the past year, rents have now gone up by 4.1%, the equivalent of an extra ?28 a month.

LSL said there was no sign of a let-up in demand from tenants.

David Newnes, of LSL, said: "Tenant demand continues to reach ever higher peaks - and there simply isn't enough rental property coming onto the market to match it.

"In areas like London where competition for rental property is most intense, it's not unheard of for rental properties to be let within a day of coming on to the market.

"We've had five successive months of rent rises, but there is no sign of a let-up anytime soon," he added.

Property shortage

LSL said that rents fell between 2008 and 2009 before starting to rise strongly again last year as the economy pulled out of recession.

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With rents rising so quickly, many landlords are being less forbearing with tenants showing signs of payment difficulties”

End Quote David Newnes LSL Property Services Earlier this week the Association of Residential Letting Agents (ARLA) said there had been a continued rise in the number of people looking for homes to rent.

It said 74% of its members had more prospective tenants on their books than homes available to let to them.

LSL said this demand was being driven by two factors.

The first was that potential home buyers were being diverted to the rental market by a lack of new homes being built.

Just 103,000 new homes were built last year with the UK's population growing strongly.

The second was that many first-time buyers were finding it difficult or impossible to raise the deposit for a mortgage.

Rents are highest in London where they have gone up by 6.9% in the past year to an average of ?1,006 a month.

Harder line

Meanwhile, LSL said tenants' arrears fell from 11.5% of all rents due to 9.3%.

This amounted to ?257m across the UK, LSL calculated.

"The improvement has been exaggerated by a change in behaviour from many landlords," Mr Newnes pointed out.

"With rents rising so quickly, many landlords are being less forbearing with tenants showing signs of payment difficulties, and are looking to replace them in expectation of higher rental income."

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Quake still rattles Sony Ericsson

15 July 2011 Last updated at 09:37 GMT Android smartphones are central to Sony Ericsson's line-up Sony Ericsson has blamed the the Japanese earthquake for a 50m euro (?44m; $71m) loss during the three months to June.

The mobile phone maker said the quake last March had caused "supply chain constraints", which meant that about 1.5m phones were not ready for sale.

Smartphones now make up more than 70% of Sony Ericsson's total sales, up from just 40% at the end of last year.

Sales of smartphones using Google's Android operating system grew 150%.

Sony Ericsson estimates that it now has an 11% share of the Android smartphone market - by both value and volume.

During the first quarter of the year, Sony Ericsson had managed to achieve net profits of 11m euro, but on an extremely slim operating margin of just 2%.

During the past few years the mobile phone firm has seen a steady erosion of its share of the mobile phone market, losing out to Apple with its iPhone models and quickly growing Asian rivals like Samsung and HTC.

The company has gone through a cost-cutting exercise, including making 4,000 staff redundant.

Sony Ericsson is a 50-50 joint venture of Japanese entertainment electronics firm Sony and Swedish telecoms equipment maker Ericsson.

Ericsson's shares fell 1.3% on news of Sony Ericsson's losses.

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Japan quake still hurting trade

8 July 2011 Last updated at 02:13 GMT Japanese carmakers were some of the hardest hit, facing supply shortages and power cuts Japan's current account surplus fell sharply in May, as the 11 March earthquake and tsunami continue to affect exports.

The surplus shrank 51.7% to 590.7bn yen ($7.27bn; ?4.55bn) compared with a year earlier, said the Ministry of Finance.

However, that is less than most analysts had expected.

The data shows that while the economy continues to suffer from the disaster, it is recovering quicker than expected.

May's fall in the current account surplus marks the third straight monthly drop after the earthquake and tsunami wreaked havoc in the north east of Japan.

In April the surplus was down 69.5%.

Trade deficit

Even as the supply chain recovers and manufacturers come back online exports are still suffering.

The data showed that exports fell by 9.8% in May from a year earlier.

While imports rose 14.7%, mainly because of higher energy costs.

That translated to the second-biggest trade deficit on record, the ministry said.

The current account is the broadest measure of a country's trade with the rest of the world.

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Mortgage approvals still subdued

29 June 2011 Last updated at 11:48 GMT House sales look likely to remain very low The UK property market is set to remain subdued in the coming months, figures from the Bank of England suggest.

New mortgages approved for house purchase, but not yet lent, rose to 45,940 in May from 45,447 in April.

Despite the slight increase, May's approval figure was lower than the average for the previous six months.

The data suggests that house sales, which have been running at half their pre-2007 levels, will also stay low in the coming months.

Meanwhile, building societies have complained again that National Savings & Investments (NS&I) is being too agressive in trying to attract savers' money.

NS&I recently relaunched its inflation-proofed investment policies.

The Building Societies' Association (BSA) said this had contributed to another outflow of funds from its members in May, of ?613m.

Adrian Coles, director general of the BSA, said: "Savings balances at mutuals fell in May, in common with other private sector deposit-takers."

"It seems likely that NS&I's index-linked products attracted much of the money deposited in this period," he said.

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Tesco bank accounts still locked

23 June 2011 Last updated at 11:12 GMT Tesco Bank, which operates in stores, online and by telephone, has about 850,000 savings accounts Some customers of Tesco Bank are still locked out of their online accounts, four days after a move of the bank's computer systems during the weekend.

The banking system crashed, locking out customers, after Tesco moved the accounts from computers run by its former partner RBS.

Tesco says most people can access their accounts and has taken on extra staff at its call centres.

However, some BBC website readers say they still cannot get their money.

"I still cannot access my internet savings account," said David, from London.

"If this wasn't an internet bank it would be the equivalent of a High Street bank closing some of its branches.

"It's been shut for four days but they advertise my money as being on instant demand," he added.

The bank's website carries an apology to customers.

"We want to apologise unreservedly to our savings customers who have experienced difficulties in accessing our online banking system in recent days," the message on the Tesco website says.

"The problem has led to an increase in call volumes to our call centre and we have not been able to answer calls as quickly as you would expect, or we would like.

"The majority of customers are able to access their accounts. However, we know there are some customers that have not been able to log in," the message adds.

'At boiling point'

The bank's website carries advice on what customers should do, especially if they use the Internet Explorer 9 web browser, which was launched earlier this year.

Tesco believes that this has a compatibility problem with its system, which can be very easily fixed if customers follow some instructions to re-set their browsers.

Many customers have been frustrated at both the computer lock-out and the inability of Tesco's call centre to deal with the big jump in calls.

"I spent four hours Tuesday 21st and a further three hours so far [on Wednesday] trying to contact their helpdesk - suffering the exasperation of a disembodied voice telling me how important my call is to them, so I don't believe the issue has been fixed," Johan Sinclair told the BBC on Wednesday.

"I am at boiling point as I have no other way to contact them and in the meantime I have no access to my account."

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Housing market 'still lacklustre'

27 May 2011 Last updated at 06:00 GMT There are few signs of a pick-up in prices or sales The UK housing market is still subdued, according to the latest monthly survey from the Nationwide building society.

It says prices rose by just 0.3% in May, which still left them 1.2% lower than a year ago at an average of ?167,208.

In the past six months prices have drifted up, by 0.6%.

But the lender's chief economist, Robert Gardner, said prices and sales reflected the lacklustre state of the economy.

"The UK economy returned to growth in the first three months of 2011, albeit at a modest pace," he said.

"Nevertheless, the modest improvement in economic conditions has so far been insufficient to pull the housing market out of its torpor, as the headwinds facing households remain strong."

Earlier this week, figures from HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) showed that sales have been stagnating.

Only 66,000 homes were sold in April, which was 1,000 fewer than in March and also 6,000 fewer than in April last year.

Borrowers wary

The latest data from the Nationwide is similar to that from other market sources.

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Recent figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) and the Bank of England on, respectively, total mortgage lending and mortgage approvals, showed no improvement from the current historically low levels of activity.

One factor weighing on the market has been the continued rationing of mortgage funds by lenders.

This has been allied to an increasing wariness by would-be borrowers because of the subdued state of the economy and fears of higher unemployment.

But property commentator Henry Pryor said the inflated expectations of sellers and estate agents were also having an effect.

"Sellers are still asking too much with average asking prices now a whopping ?239,000, according to the website Rightmove," he said.

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Property sales still stagnating

24 May 2011 Last updated at 12:23 GMT No sign of an upturn in the housing market yet Property sales in the UK are still lower than a year ago, according to HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC).

Just 66,000 homes were sold in April, 1,000 fewer than in March and 6,000 fewer than in April last year.

Sales in the first four months of the year have been 5% lower than in the same period of 2010.

The figures suggest that with the continued rationing of mortgages, and the economy in the doldrums, there is little chance of sales reviving.

Last week, the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) reported that total mortgage lending in April had fallen back from March and was 5% down on a year ago.

The drop was attributed to seasonal factors, such Easter falling in April, and an extra bank holiday.

However, all the accumulating evidence on sales, prices and mortgage lending indicates that the property market has stagnated, with little obvious evidence of any immediate upturn.

The Bank of England reported at the start of the month that the number of mortgages approved but not yet granted, a traditionally accurate indication of near-term trends, had risen in April to 47,557.

But that figure was only slightly higher than the monthly average for the past six months.

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