My name's Alex and this is my website all about Benidorm in Spain. Register now for free to talk about Brexit and the EU: living, holidaying and moving to Benidorm and much more!
tebo53 wrote on Thu Apr 25, 2024 1:01am:
I didn't let the house because I didn't want the hassle of maintenance, insurances or having to (maybe) return for inspection etc, etc.
I know you can employ companies to look after things for you but I'd also read about bad tenants who don't pay the rent, steal things and wreck your house then dissappear etc. Why have all those things to think about when I've retired to Spain? I sold up and enjoyed the money. I still visit the U...
Read more...
...K but its totally for pleasure!
Finally, I don't believe in having a "bolt hole" to return to if things don't work out as I wouldn't want to go back to live in the town or area that I had left!!
Steve
Clearly, it's a personal preference - but over the last 10 years or so, the tax noose has tightened significantly on those owning rental property directly (as opposed to a limited company) so the returns are likely to be considerably lower going forward - and that is leaving aside the possibility of suffering voids or losses due to bad tenants.
As someone with a reasonable sized property portfolio in the UK - some of which I directly manage and some of which are dealt with via a letting agent, I can certainly see the attraction of either allowing the money that would be realised by selling the property to either sit in a bank earning now reasonable interest rates or alternatively sit in a diversified portfolio of large cap companies (FTSE100 or equivalent) paying a steady stream of dividends at say between 3% to 4%. You could also invest an some form of tracker but noting that any stock/share investment is inherently more risky than cash in the bank.
EDIT - as a recent example, I'm currently going through the process of a buildings insurance claim on one of my properties which will end up being a tidy 4 figure sum. It's been a nightmare trying to sort out getting quotations let alone initially sorting out the emergency work that was needed when the issue was first raised by the tenant. & this was one of the properties through a letting agent who did some of the heavy lifting - although I'm now waiting on receiving paperwork from the letting agent to be able to submit to the insurers despite having paid for the works. So a painful cashflow experience that actually impacts cash - as opposed to a decline in a share price which only becomes of relevance when you actually crystallise the loss.
However, over the last 10 years, cash in the bank has suffered in real terms due to interest rates generally being less than inflation.
The biggest issue now for me is the capital gains tax position - and that tax position now means I'm quite happy to sit and hold largely unencumbered UK property as the CGT hit would bring a tear to my eye!
If I'd known the Conservative UK govt was going to hate on private landlords the way they have, I'd have structured my investments differently but such is life.
Long standing tenants make life a lot easier - as they also I find do a better job of maintaining the property and not asking for an electrician to come out and change a lightbulb! & if you look after the property, long standing tenants are much easier to come by!
But all this is going off at a massive tangent to the original question posed.
