Latest housing research: Reforming the private rented sector

The valuable Wales and Northern Ireland reports focus on the question of how effective the sector is at fulfilling the needs of different types of households.

Welsh housing and homelessness charity Shelter Cymru challenges the Office for National Statistics’ affordability methodology. Given that this is reliant on median incomes, it blurs the pressures on actual households using that sector.

The report finds that, by its own calculus, the PRS is only affordable where the household has two full-time working adults, two or fewer children and lives in mid-Wales, a narrow slice of a much bigger sector.

The authors suggest that more must be done to understand the role of the PRS in the housing system and that the government needs to look closely at rent stabilisation and stronger tenant protections.

While the Northern Ireland report is focused on older people, there are many parallels with the Wales report. Indeed, both speak to issues that cross the UK: the continuing rise in the number of older households in the PRS with reduced incomes in older age, continued rent inflation and the potential impact on the housing benefit bill (see Rhiannon Williams and David Robinson’s 2024 report for a forward view to 2040).

The IPPR team looks at housing costs and concludes that over two million renters face high housing costs (defined as more than 20% of income), around 40% of those in this sector.

Their report then goes on to consider how those costs could be controlled, and the case for introducing rent controls in England, drawing on national and international experience.

They suggest that rent controls of one form or another are now widespread in the developed world and that, if implemented carefully, can provide a way to tackle high rental housing costs.

It is a useful and considered review, albeit the evidence to support the case for effective intervention seems somewhat limited, and we should not ignore the need to take full account of differing national contexts.

The study from charity JRF goes a step further by proposing rent controls alongside tax reform related to landlords as a mitigant, at least for those whose returns are more modest. This highlights the complexity of the equations that have to be solved – rent controls might help tenants, but if supply is diminished, then rents could rise.

As this suggests, there is a wide spectrum of landlords with quite different sets of circumstances regarding their costs, profits, expectations and needs. Linking that to the very divergent tenant population gives some sense of the scale of the challenge any effective reform must be able to deliver.

Finally, we have the study undertaken by the NEF thinktank. Again, it covers territory already discussed above, though here focused on rebuilding a system of “fair rents”.

“The study from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation highlights the complexity of the equations that have to be solved – rent controls might help tenants, but if supply is diminished, then rents could rise”

The NEF proposes an immediate emergency brake on annual rent rises for PRS tenants, with increases limited to the lower of the Consumer Price Index or a fixed 2% cap. This would be applied to rent increases for all tenancies, including between tenancies, but would only apply until a new system was in place.

The scope of the new PRS database created by the Renters’ Rights Act 2025 would be extended to help tackle the chronic lack of good data available to develop the policy.

There would be a series of fair-rents pilot schemes and, from these, a national fair-rents system would be created on a phased basis – with justifiable exemptions, such as new builds.

As these reports highlight, the private rented sector is complex and varied. Developing policy to address its current weaknesses is challenging, to say the least.

However, as this article indicates, an active debate is now taking place, and it is important that the government builds on its recent policy programme, not least by really tackling the long-standing data deficits which, in turn, would allow for a much better-informed policy debate. There is strong public support for further reform.

Peter Williams, researcher and departmental fellow, Department of Land Economy, University of Cambridge; and member, Thinkhouse Editorial Panel

Thinkhouse has launched the 2026 Early Career Researchers Prize. Sponsored by Inside Housing, Altair, L&Q and Aster, the prize winner receives £500 and coverage in Inside Housing. If you are engaged in housing research, click here for more information.