This article appeared in Scottish Housing News last Friday. I have issues with it.

CIH Scotland and SFHA both support exemption from controls specifically over so-called mid-market rented properties.

These rents are deemed to be ‘affordable’ and exemption has been called for by housing associations and ‘other stakeholders’ (presumably including local authorities) to comfort potential funders/investors.

It is good to note that exemption from control will be forfeit if tenancy agreement terms do not restrict rent increases to levels higher than the market rent median.

And that exemption will only apply where the  Scottish Government (SG) or local authority has or is funding the landlord or a 3rd party ‘and there are conditions attached to that funding which restrict the landlord’s ability to increase the rent’.

So, these MMR properties are owned and/or managed by a taxpayer-subsidised, reputable, socially responsible and accountable registered social landlord (RSL)/housing association (HA) or local authority regulated by the Scottish Housing Regulator (SHR).

Such organisations recognise median rents (and therefore, presumably, median incomes) as essential components of ‘affordability’ tests.

Not so, Build to Rent (BTR) projects (or Purpose Built Student Accommodation (PBSA) which also has escaped rent control - not via the recent Housing Act but a decade ago in the 2016 Act - and which does not get a mention in this article).

BTR projects receive no government/taxpayer subsidy (rents are lower than market levels because of funding support from the private developer or its funders) and they reflect average rather than median incomes (which in Edinburgh are £58k and £34k respectively).

Although the ‘intermediate rents’ which apply to BTR are deemed ‘affordable’ (both in housing and planning terms) because they are lower than full market rents, I am not aware of any social landlord which is developing BTR schemes.

Because of this and because BTR developers are regulated by nothing apart from the marketplace, BTR should not be exempt from rent control.
It is to all intents and purposes a Private Rented Sector (PRS) activity, precisely what rent controls are meant to be for.

What’s to stop developers proposing rents which purport to be lower than market rents initially in order to meet local authority Affordable Housing Policy stipulations but which subsequently are increased to equal full market rents?

BTR developers have escaped exemption with SG help through the back door opened by those who (to be fair) had argued for MMR exemption only.
Talk about unintended consequences!

Whatever, rent controls are not the answer anyway (an adequate supply of social housing is…).

• Craig Sanderson is a former chief executive of Link Housing and a member of the Edinburgh Poverty Commission