Recent reports have revealed over half of private landlords suffered from lost rental income because of the unprecedented circumstances of the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to the National Residential Landlords Association’s survey for the fourth quarter of last year – some 56 per cent had lost rental income, with 12 per cent having lost more than 20 per cent that income.

Drilling down further into the numbers of whose who lost income, 22 per cent lost over £5,000 and 59 per cent lost in excess of £1,000. Elsewhere the level of losses were still increasing for some 36 per cent.

Of those losing non-rental income as well, 41 per cent lost over £1,000 and 20 per cent losing over £5,000.

NRLA chief executive Ben Beadle said of the results: “Although most landlords have done everything they can to help tenants affected as a result of the pandemic, we have now reached the end of what they are able to do.

“Simply continuing to ban repossessions just means that tenants struggling to pay their rent are accumulating more debt reducing the chances that they will be able to pay it off. This ultimately will put more renters at risk of losing their homes.

“Ministers need to develop a proper plan to sustain tenancies and help the rental market recover. This needs to include a financial package to enable tenants to pay off any arrears built as a direct result of the pandemic.”

The NRLA report also revealed that a third of landlords are entertaining the notion that they were now more likely to either leave the market entirely or sell some properties and reduce their portfolio.

The findings go some way to showing the importance of landlords having the safety net of a lettings agent with a rent guarantee policy in the currently trying environment.