Hi everyone,
I’m looking for some opinions on a rent review for my property.
The property is a 3-bedroom detached house in Towcester (NN12), purchased in December 2025. It’s let unfurnished but is finished to a high standard, with a renovated kitchen and bathrooms, integrated appliances (dishwasher, washing machine, fridge, oven and hob), professionally fitted blinds throughout, landscaped rear garden, detached garage and two parking spaces. It’s in a quiet cul-de-sac.
The tenancy started in February 2026 at £1,650 pcm.
The tenants have been excellent—just a professional couple with no children or pets. They pay on time, look after the property well and have caused no issues at all. Ideally, I’d like to keep them for the long term.
I’m conscious that if I don’t increase the rent for several years, it could eventually require a much larger increase, which I’d rather avoid. Equally, I don’t want to risk losing great tenants by increasing it unnecessarily.
My questions are:
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Would you increase the rent after the first year, and if so, by how much?
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Would you use inflation (e.g. 2–4%) as a guide, or base it purely on current market rents?
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If you had tenants like these, would you prioritise keeping them at a slightly below-market rent, or aim to move the rent closer to market value over time?
I’d be interested to hear how other landlords approach this balance between maximising rent and retaining excellent tenants.
Thanks in advance.
@Nadim1
I usually pitch my rents slightly below similar properties in the local area and increase yearly or every other year to cover inflation. With the new RRA I would propose a rent at the upper end of the local market and negotiate something slightly lower. I found Openrent’s rent calculator very useful as a guide for determining the level of rent that can be achieved.
Best!
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@Nadim1
Good tenants are ones willing to pay a fair market price for a good service. Why wouldnt you always propose a market rate increase and see if they accept it. If market rates were for some reason increasing way faster than average earnings I’d probably think twice however and suggest something based on wage inflation. Equally if they pay the right rate they can expect the right service too.
Your third question implies you started them at below market rent - why would you do that?
Under RRA any increase which cant be justified in terms of market rents wont be legal. It doesnt matter what general inflation is doing, if you try and price above market rents you can be challenged
1% on your rental is less than 20 quid. If they gave notice and left you could easily have a month or more void which will swallow up such an increase many times over. There’s also a lot of value in keeping good tenants, much better than the risk of bad ones next time
I do have some excellent long term tenants whom I recently offered a below market rent increase, but it was based on some specifics - my freeholder has not increased the service charges this year and they have done some repairs themselves which normally I would have expected to pay for, and are tolerant of minor faults rather than insisting on replacing new all the time.
good luck
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