Rents down by more than 16 per cent

Desperate homeowners are flooding the rental market with homes they cannot sell and rents have plummeted by more than 16 per cent, according to figures from Globrix. The number of new homes coming on to the rental market has increase by 57 per cent in the first quarter of this year, compared with the last three months of last year, with Carlisle showing the biggest rise of 171 per cent. The over-supply has also pushed the average rent down from £950 in May last year to an average of £795 at the start of March.