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George Osborne’s buy-to-let reforms fail to dissuade investors – Comparethemarket.com

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Buy-to-let investors have not let chancellor George Osborne's recently announced reforms dampen their enthusiasm for the market, with enquiries on Comparethemarket.com rocketing so far this year.

The website's data shows that buy-to-let enquiries were up by 20 per cent in the first eight months of the year, compared to the same period of last year, and in July and August the comparison site saw almost 52 per cent more queries than in the same months of 2014.

This increased interest comes despite changes revealed by Osborne in his Summer Budget, which included a limit on tax relief for buy-to-let landlords.

Jody Baker, head of money at Comparethemarket.com, said the data “seems to have confounded expectations following what was originally thought to have been a difficult Summer Budget for buy-to-let landlords”.

“A key factor in the remarkable year-on-year increase in buy-to-let enquiries may have been a wave of pension money suddenly available to consumers and the buy-to-let market becoming an attractive and recognised investment by those looking to generate income in retirement,” she said.

Buy-to-let enquiries in the first three months of 2015, ahead of the introduction of the new pension freedoms, were only three per cent higher than the same period in 2014.

However, since the introduction of the new pension rules at the beginning of April, the difference has been more marked. From April to June 2015, Comparethemarket.com recorded almost a 23 per cent increase in volumes compared to the same period in 2014.