Rental property hard to find in Britain? Blame the government attacks on landlords
In 1998, Mrs Thatcher de-regulated private landlording to good effect, with "assured shorthold tenancies". It led to a big rise in private provision of rental accomodation. But her work has steadily been undone in various ways by more recent British governments
Governments worldwide get enthused from time to time about steps they might take to "help" tenants. Sadly, what they often come up with (restrictions of various sorts) makes life more difficult for landlords, which is pretty brainless. If you chase landlords away, you make it harder for tenants to find a place to stay. And what remains will inevitably cost more. You can't lower prices (rents) by reducing the supply. Only a Leftist would think you can
Anita Parkinson has been a landlord since 2009. The 62-year-old used to own six properties but she started selling them off three years ago. She is now waiting for her remaining tenants to move out so she can get rid of her last two.
Ms Parkinson, who asked for her last name to be changed, said the “final straw” was a proposed change that would require all newly rented properties to have a minimum Energy Performance Certificate rating of C by 2025. She said upgrading her properties to meet the standard would cost between £14,000 and £17,000.
“It got to the point where there was so much legislation that it was just becoming untenable,” she said. “I’m absolutely done.”
Ms Parkinson is part of a growing wave of landlords selling off rental properties, hit by increased regulation, soaring mortgage rates and spiralling upfront energy efficiency costs. Some 16pc of all property sellers this year were landlords, according to estate agents Hamptons. In London, the figure was 19pc. These are the highest levels since 2018.
Even those heading for the exit face punitive charges. Landlords will lose thousands of pounds in sale profits under proposals. Thousands who cashed out reaped the benefits house price growth, but the Government is now poised to take a bigger slice of their profits.
The number of rental properties on the market is at its lowest level in three years, according to research firm TwentyCi, indicating landlords are divesting – with a knock-on impact on renters. The total number of rented homes fell by 258,000 between 2016-17 and 2020-21, equal to 5pc, Hamptons found.
Ms Parkinson initially became a landlord to supplement her income, but said she is no longer making any money because of the Government’s crackdown on buy-to-let. She started selling her properties after requirements were brought in for new electrical checks. She had to spend nearly £6,000 upgrading the wiring on one of her properties, which wiped out her profits.
“I have a small pension but this was my income,” she said. “In the last two years, unfortunately, there has been nothing because every single penny that’s gone in has come back out in costs.”
Ms Parkinson, from Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, is also terrified of plans to ban no-fault evictions which would make it difficult for her to remove troublesome tenants. She said she is fed up with the demonisation of good, responsible landlords like herself, whom she describes as “social pariahs”.
“I just feel as if the Government’s out to destroy me,” she said. “I feel incredibly upset.”
For other landlords, it is rising interest rates that are proving to be the final straw.
Karen Smith, 36, from Esher in Surrey, bought a second property with her husband during the pandemic and started letting out their first home. They had secured a fixed mortgage rate of 1.75pc, which has ended recently. They have now moved on to a variable rate.
“It’s going up and up and up,” she said. Ms Smith, who asked for her last name to be changed, said her payments have been increasing by £100 a month because of soaring interest rates. Her tenants are moving out in December and she is anxious to find a buyer before they leave. She cannot afford to keep paying the mortgage if the flat is empty.
“I can’t be in a loss situation; it’s really stressful,” she said.
Another reason she decided to sell was because she feared that new tenants would end up in arrears. Ms Smith, who works in PR, said she has been lucky but has heard “horror stories” of tenants owing thousands because they cannot pay.
“Because of the rights that tenants have, it’s very difficult to take action,” she said. “I’m not a property portfolio person – I have a job, I just happen to have a property that I rent out. I simply would not be able to afford two mortgages just because somebody can’t pay their rent.
“I know that means that a rental property is being taken off the market in a housing crisis, but it’s not fair that everyone is expecting landlords to have deep enough pockets to pay mortgages endlessly.”
David Fell, of Hamptons, said landlords selling up is likely to mean higher rent payments as the same number of tenants chase fewer properties.
https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/other/i-m-absolutely-done-with-being-a-landlord/ar-AA13JrUJ
**********************************************************‘I Had to Become Feminine’: Businesswoman, 42 and Single, Breaks Down, Ditches Feminism to Find Husband
An accomplished career woman with a headhunting firm in Washington, she was like a superstar in some people’s books. There’s “a glamor” to women working outside the home, she says. Yet weirdly the feminist values Stingley once venerated—for garnering success, a genuine sense of accomplishment—suddenly rang hollow.
Something was missing.
Then 42—not a man in sight—Stingley panicked, had a breakdown, and decided she wanted marriage. “You go home to an empty apartment,” she told The Epoch Times. “I used to have breakdowns when something would break in my home, I would get so resentful. A man should be fixing this!” But the type she was praying for was scarce in the “hyper careerist environment” of D.C. Her breakdown was an exit sign.
A total transformation of her careerist views followed, delivering her from the “feminist wilderness” she was mired in. It took humility and digging deep, but she rebuilt herself and all she thought she knew of womanhood. It was worth it, she says. Certain things are ingrained; the sooner you embrace them the better. The year was 2002 when her embracing began.
A Race for a Husband
Stingley’s off-ramp led to Texas, where she moved in with her sister and brother-in-law in Irving. A resignment trailed her: that she would pick from a pool of “broken people,” but that never happened. Maybe things weren’t so dire after all. “My sister and her husband were scheming about finding me a husband, and normally that would have humiliated me,” she said. “But I’m like, ‘Scheme away!’”
Stingley was very ready—or so she thought.
Within two months, in August, her sister and brother-in-law, avid runners, hooked Stingley up with a runner fella at Fort Worth’s annual Runners’ Club Labor Day Race. Richard, an aerospace engineer, wasn’t broken; they hit it off, and in December they were hitched, though their happily ever after wouldn’t happen overnight.
That old job of Stingley’s —like some perverse testosterone treatment— had made her masculine, she says. That dynamism, so intoxicating in the corporate world, now affronted both her husband and a harmonious marriage.
“I was loud, I was boisterous. I gave off, I call it, ‘repellent,’ ‘male repellent,’” she said. “I was so controlling. … I think the culture encourages men to be controlled and to be submissive, which I did not want. So, I was determined not to do that. But that took years.
“I had to become more feminine.”
Her chronically scrutinizing Richard didn’t jive well —despite his own feminist leanings. There was room for just one tiger on this mountain, yet she caught herself in time: The feminist teaches to keep men “wrapped around your finger;” she rejected that. Honestly, women are “repelled by male weakness,” she admitted. “But they can’t stop destroying their own nest.”
Turning her gaze inward, she fixed herself first. As she changed, he changed. And peace followed.
Stingley cultivated femininity purposefully. She stopped “despising girly things” like making dinners, but humbly embraced nurturing home ambience. “Put on the dress, put on the earrings, shave your armpits, do your hair, and love it,” she said, adding: “Be chaste.”
Media Dismantling Marriage?
If “being chaste” seems out of touch today, Stingley, a devout Christian, knows why. TV and the media, besides spewing feminism, tear women down by glamorizing promiscuity. Unmarried women’s acting like wives—“doing laundry, having sex, making meals”—defeats what men were created for, Stingley says, which is “to honor you, to sacrifice for you.”
Elevating one’s self lifts others around you —including men, bringing them “up to what they were supposed to be,” she added. “The men you want to marry, they will love that. And it gets that ring on your finger in record time.”
How the media portrays relations seems slanted, most conspicuously, toward dismantling marriage. Those shown having affairs are “tremendously happy,” Stingley observed. The homosexual component couples? “Very happy.” The married couple? “Hating each other.”
Men, too, are harmed by the scourge of feminism. When women become like men, men say sayonara.
“They just leave society, they just don’t marry, they play video games,” Stingley said. “When they feel ostracized from society, by women, put down—it’s open season on men—they check out and there’s no one to marry. But women can recapture it … they’ll easily come alive again.”
For eons, women have embraced having both babies and husbands, she adds. Traditional mothers were the backbone of nations. Men sacrificed. “We’ve lost sight of that,” said Stingley. “We are so independent, we dare not be dependent on another human being. And I think it hurts. It’s an attitude that is risk-free.”
Turning Women Into Wives
This August marks 20 years from when they first met. Stingley, now 63, rates their marriage a 10 out of 10, a far cry from the rocky “1 or 2” when they started.
Throughout the years, she’s connected with likeminded, marriage-seeking women via website Feminist Fallacy, Girls’ Night Out support group, and the Christian singles’ outreach she founded for her lonely friends in D.C. She’s helped women contend with the pervasive, but easily dispersed, notion: “It’s easier to get struck by lightning, than for a woman over 40 to get married.”
Today, Stingley continues to cultivate the traditional, feminine traits she so espouses.
What words has she for young belles still budding in their 20s, their whole lives ahead, full of potential?
“I do not want them to go through what I went through, what my friends have gone through,” Stingley said. “Marriage is risky. … But don’t tell me it’s not worth it. You can get fired from a job, that’s a risk. But what is more devastating? What is more worth the risk?”
In short: sidestep the abyss, and the feminist lies she fell for. Do embrace tradition, which has preserved societies for eons. Get an education? Yes, it’s important, Stingley says. A career? Sure, working a little before marriage can lead to greater appreciation for what it offers.
Family is the “essence of life,” she added. “You won’t have to panic when Christmas comes along and you have nowhere to go. … Just do it. Don’t just marry anybody, but you have options. And don’t be afraid to be traditional.”
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Donald Trump rails against Democrats at US midterms rally, hinting again at a 2024 presidential run
Donald Trump has hinted at another presidential run, decried "twisted race and gender" teachings in schools, and said his Democratic rivals were "either stupid or they hate our country", during a midterm elections campaign rally in the US.
"If you want to stop the destruction of our country and save the American dream then this Tuesday you must vote Republican in a giant way," Mr Trump said at a rally in Latrobe, south-east of Pittsburgh.
As he spoke to the crowd three days ahead of midterm elections that will determine control of Congress, Mr Trump, who sources say is preparing to launch a third run for the White House after the midterms, continued to claim that his 2020 defeat was the result of widespread fraud.
Opinion polls show a significant number of Republican voters accept the claim, as do many candidates for Congress, governor and state offices overseeing election administration.
"We are going to take back that beautiful house," Mr Trump said of the 2024 presidential race.
The evening rally in Latrobe was part of a late blitz that will also take Mr Trump to Florida and Ohio. He's hoping a strong GOP showing will generate momentum for the 2024 run that he's expected to launch in the days or weeks after polls close.
Mr Trump decried what he called "a bloody crime wave" and warned that educators were indoctrinating children with "twisted race and gender" teachings.
Of his Democratic opponents, Mr Trump said: "They're either stupid or they hate our country."
He also warned of the possibility of election fraud in the coming midterm elections.
"Our country's never been as bad as it now," Mr Trump said. "We have a country in decline."
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Federal court rules in favor of Louisville photographer who opposes same-sex weddings
A federal district court has ruled in favor of a Louisville photographer who filed a lawsuit against the city in 2019, alleging its Fairness Ordinance violated her constitutional rights as a Christian because it could force her to take on same-sex wedding assignments.
In a 44-page ruling Tuesday from U.S. District Court Judge Benjamin Beaton, the court granted a request by Chelsey Nelson, owner of Chelsey Nelson Photography, for an injunction against the city's ordinance, saying the city could not use the law to compel her to photograph same-sex weddings or "otherwise express messages inconsistent with Nelson's beliefs," and could not prohibit her from advertising on her website that she only photographs opposite-sex ceremonies.
Her lawsuit had claimed through the Fairness Ordinance, the city was forcing her to promote and participate in ceremonies that she opposed for religious reasons. And the judge agreed, saying in the ruling that while she had never been asked to photograph a same-sex wedding, "state law protects her photography and associated blogging from the burdens the City seeks to impose."
In 2020, U.S. District Judge Justin Walker had previously blocked the city from enforcing the ordinance against Nelson and preventing her from advertising her services on her website as exclusively for opposite-sex couples.
Opinion from Nelson:Louisville photographer: As a Christian, I shouldn't be forced to work same-sex weddings
In the latest ruling, Beaton said the Fairness Ordinance does not "survive" strict scrutiny and could not restrict First Amendment rights. Nelson's refusal to photograph same-sex couple weddings is born out of a true religious belief, his order said, and the ruling said financial and legal burdens Nelson faces for following her beliefs and violating the Fairness Ordinance "are quite substantial."
In 1999, Louisville passed the Fairness Ordinance, which prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in housing, public accommodations and employment.
Nelson was represented in her lawsuit by The Alliance Defending Freedom, which said in a statement following the ruling that she is "a photographer who serves clients regardless of their backgrounds," though in the lawsuit and additional statements Nelson had argued she would not work same-sex weddings because of her "passion for marriage" and her insistence to work "ceremonies in a way that reflects my views of marriage."
Alliance Defending Freedom Legal Counsel Bryan Neihart said in the statement Wednesday that he was happy with the court's decision.
“We’re pleased the court agreed that the city violated Chelsey’s First Amendment rights. The court’s decision sends a clear and necessary message to every Kentuckian — and American — that each of us is free to speak and work according to our deeply held beliefs," Neihart said.
Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer, meanwhile, said in a statement he disagreed with the court's ruling and that city officials "will likely be appealing this decision."
"We are a city of compassion and we appreciate the many ways our LGBTQ+ family contributes to our diverse community," Fischer said. "Louisville Metro Government will continue to enforce to the fullest extent possible its ordinance prohibiting anti-discriminatory practices and will fight against discrimination in any form."
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My other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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Kristina Pimenova, once said to be the most beautiful girl in the world. Note blue eyes and blonde hair
Bliss: What every woman wants: to feel safe and secure in the arms of her man. Robert Irwin and Rorie Buckey. See 
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