Institutional landlords are doing most of the heavy lifting in some of the UK’s best-known regeneration zones, according to new research that puts build to rent regeneration at the centre of housing delivery over the past decade.
The study, by NRLA Living and Bidwells, found that build to rent (BTR) supplied an average of 61 per cent of new homes across eight leading UK regeneration areas in that period. That is a remarkable share for a sector that accounts for under two per cent of national housing stock, and it raises pointed questions for private landlords about where rental competition is heading.
The research examined eight BTR-led schemes around the UK, measuring the sector’s wider effect on local demographics, employment, incomes and rent levels.
In two locations, the tenure has all but monopolised new building. BTR accounted for 87 per cent of all homes completed over the last 10 years in both Stratford in London and Redcliff in Bristol.
Milton Keynes Central was not far behind at 73 per cent, while Blackhorse Lane in Waltham Forest came in at 66 per cent.
Build to rent regeneration as an anchor tenant
The report’s central argument is that BTR does more than add units to the tally. It casts purpose-built rental neighbourhoods as anchor tenants for regeneration schemes, capable of driving mixed-use development around them.
The demographic pull is marked. On average, the research found, BTR draws five times as many 20 to 39-year-olds into new regeneration areas as other local authority areas.
Iain Murray, partner and head of operational living at Bidwells, argued that judging the sector purely on unit numbers misses its wider role. “Across the schemes we examined, BTR has acted as the catalyst for regeneration, putting people on site early, giving local businesses the footfall they need to establish themselves and drawing younger working-age households into areas that had previously struggled to attract them,” he said.
He added that the timing of the evidence was significant. “That evidence matters now because capital is being committed to operational living in a far more complex regulatory and fiscal environment than five years ago,” he said.
“Investment decisions of this scale should rest on data, and this report gives investors, local authorities and government a clearer basis on which to judge where BTR sits in the housing mix.”
Anyone tracking the Build to Rent investment forecast for 2026 will recognise the weight of institutional money Murray is describing.
The findings follow a recent NRLA Living launch event, at which senior figures from the institutional BTR market gathered to debate the future of residential investment and operations. The NRLA’s summary of the research sets out the headline figures.
Ben Beadle, chief executive of the National Residential Landlords Association, said the organisation regards BTR as a valuable contributor to UK housing supply, alongside traditional buy to let (BTL). He was blunt about what that requires from ministers.
“These research findings demonstrate that housing delivery can only happen at scale if the Government takes steps to ensure investment is encouraged rather than stifled. Crucially, we believe that a thriving BTR market must complement a growing BTL sector if the UK is ever going to meet its ambitious housing objectives,” he said.
The pairing is deliberate. Beadle’s case is that institutional and individual landlords should be treated as partners in supply, not as rivals competing for policy favour.
What this means for investors
For portfolio landlords, the figures are effectively a map of where the competition sits. In regeneration zones where BTR has delivered the large majority of new stock, smaller investors are pitching older or less amenity-rich homes against professionally managed blocks aimed squarely at the same young, working-age tenants.
There is an opportunity in that, too. If BTR schemes bring people and footfall on site early, as the report suggests, demand can firm up in surrounding streets well before the wider regeneration is finished, and buy-to-let investors positioned on the fringes of such schemes may benefit from the halo.
That matters all the more given the squeeze on new rental supply across the wider market, which should keep tenant demand firm.
Looking ahead, much depends on the policy climate both Murray and Beadle flag. If government treats institutional and private rented investment as complementary, the regeneration pipeline should keep favouring BTR, and landlords nearby stand to gain; if the fiscal and regulatory burden keeps rising, both ends of the market will feel it, and investors should price that risk into any purchase close to a regeneration scheme.
