When did landlords become the enemy?

I have worked in the private rented sector for more than 30 years and, if I'm honest, I have never known the relationship between landlords and tenants to feel quite as fractured as it does today.

It feels as though the conversation around housing has become increasingly divided, with landlords and tenants often portrayed as being on opposite sides. Yet the reality is that both ultimately depend on one another, and neither benefits from the growing sense of division that surrounds the private rented sector.

Today’s reality is harder for both landlords and tenants

Being a tenant in 2026 is incredibly difficult. Rents have risen significantly over recent years, the cost of living continues to bite, and many people are spending an exorbitant proportion of their income simply keeping a roof over their heads. Home ownership, once considered an achievable aspiration, now feels further away than ever for thousands of people who expected they would eventually buy, but now fear they may rent for life. I completely understand why that creates resentment.

After all, most tenants did not choose to become lifelong renters. Many feel trapped by circumstances beyond their control. Decades of underinvestment in social housing, years of insufficient housebuilding, rising property prices and higher borrowing costs have all combined to create a housing system that simply is not delivering enough homes for the people who need them. But while tenant hardship is very real, so too are the pressures facing landlords.

The picture often painted is that landlords simply put the rent up each year and enjoy ever-increasing profits. The reality is much more complicated. Higher mortgage costs, increasing taxation, licensing schemes, greater regulation and an ever-growing list of legal responsibilities have fundamentally changed the economics of running a rental business.

The Renters' Rights Act will introduce another significant wave of change, including landlord redress, the Decent Homes Standard and new compliance obligations. I have said for years that landlords should become more professional and I genuinely welcome many of these reforms because higher standards benefit everyone. However, professionalism also comes with additional costs, and no business can absorb rising costs indefinitely.

At the same time, many landlords are deciding the numbers no longer stack up and are leaving the sector altogether. When supply reduces while demand continues to grow, rents rise even further. Nobody wins.

The 'them and us' narrative helps nobody

One moment during the NLIS exhibition last week really summed up where we have arrived as a sector. At the start of my session at the event, I asked around 150 landlords in the audience a simple question: “How many of you openly tell people you are a landlord?" Only seven hands went up.

For me, that was perhaps the most telling moment of the entire day. When people providing homes for thousands of people no longer feel comfortable admitting what they do, we have moved well beyond healthy debate and into something far more divisive.

Of course there are bad landlords. Equally, there are bad tenants. I have spent much of my career dealing with them and encouraging higher standards across the industry, but they are not the majority.

The vast majority of tenancies are successful. Landlords receive their rent, tenants have somewhere they are happy to call home, and both move on at the end of the tenancy without ever needing legal action. Those stories don't make headlines.

Instead, the public conversation around housing has increasingly become one of conflict. Successive governments have understandably focused much of their attention on driving up standards in the private rented sector, while media coverage has naturally highlighted the very worst examples of landlord and tenant behaviour. Both have their place, but together they have also helped create a narrative where landlords and tenants are too often portrayed as opponents rather than partners. The danger is that, once people start seeing each other as the problem, we stop talking about the real problem - a housing system that simply isn't delivering enough homes.

That "them and us" mentality helps nobody because landlords and tenants do not have opposing interests. Good landlords need good tenants every bit as much as tenants need responsible landlords.

Housing works best when relationships work

Working on possession cases every day gives me a perspective that perhaps many people do not see. When a landlord recovers possession of a property, they may feel relieved, particularly if there has been a relationship breakdown between the two parties. However, I also see the tenant desperately searching for another home in an already overstretched market. Very often, neither side feels like they have won.

That is why I believe we need a more constructive conversation about housing.

Disagreement is healthy. Debate is healthy. Campaigning for change is an important part of any democracy. But lasting solutions will only come from meaningful dialogue between everyone involved in the sector.

I would much rather see landlord organisations, tenant groups, charities such as Shelter and policymakers sitting around the same table, acknowledging the uncomfortable truth…both landlords and tenants are operating within a housing system that is failing to meet demand.

Neither side created the housing shortage, and neither side is responsible for decades of underbuilding. What we are seeing now is the consequence of a broken housing market: a shrinking private rented sector, rising rents and increasing numbers of households being forced into temporary accommodation. While some will inevitably disagree, my experience is that most landlords are not increasing rents to maximise profits; they are responding to rising mortgage costs, taxation, regulation and compliance costs simply to keep their businesses viable.

Professionalism must be matched by partnership

I have long believed that being a landlord is a profession, not a hobby, which is why landlord education should eventually become mandatory. Better-informed landlords create better homes, communicate more effectively and ultimately deliver better outcomes for tenants. The Renters' Rights Act will continue driving that professionalism and, in many respects, that is a positive step. My gut feeling is that, with all these changes coming in, things might get worse before they get better. However, professionalism alone will not solve the housing crisis.

What we also need is a more balanced conversation - one that recognises the genuine challenges facing tenants while also acknowledging the realities landlords face in providing much-needed homes. Equally, there needs to be greater public understanding of what is involved in providing and managing rental property today, and why many of the costs associated with renting have changed so significantly over the past decade.

Understanding does not have to mean agreement, but it does create respect.

Governments will come and go, and housing policy will continue to evolve, but one thing won’t change: the private rented sector remains an essential part of our housing system, and landlords and tenants will always need each other. The relationship between them should never be built on suspicion, resentment or the idea that one side must lose for the other to win. It should be a partnership, because good landlords need good tenants every bit as much as good tenants need good landlords.

If we continue to encourage a "them and us" mentality, the only thing that grows is division. The housing crisis cannot be solved through blame or putting landlord and tenants against one another. It will only be solved when we stop seeing each other as opponents and start recognising that we are all trying to navigate the same broken housing system.

If we can begin by listening to why both sides feel the way they do, we might finally start having the conversation that this housing crisis has needed for a very long time and work on ways to start improving it… together.

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