Landlords 'alienated by government policies'

This article was brought to you by Rentman the premium rent management software.

Landlords may become being alienated by the government's pre-election showboating policies, the British Property Federation (BPF) has warned.

The government recently announced plans to make landlords apply to their local councils for planning permission to convert family properties into shared accommodation.

There are also plans to introduce a national registration scheme for landlords.

Ian Fletcher, director of policy at the BPF, said it was important that new legislation was fair to good landlords while still targeting the bad ones.

He said: "We will defend landlords' interests robustly on any legislative proposals because past experience has shown that policy theory often ends up being indiscriminate in practice."

There is growing opposition from landlords to the registration scheme, he added.

Changes in legislation affect more than one million private landlords and a recent survey by Paragon Mortgages found that regulation was the biggest worry for six out of ten landlords in 2010.

How to stay legally compliant with letting agency software