How renting in London became an unimaginable hellscape
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The process of finding somewhere to rent in the capital is like competing in the Hunger Games. It’s easy to lose your dignity, writes Ellie Muir. Will tenants ever be freed from this misery?. I have a special motto for approaching London’s rental market: choose violence. Not in the literal sense – I don’t aggressively chase estate agents down the street or wallop landlords over the head with a frying pan – it’s more of a mindset.
![[There has been a huge uptick in listings from live-in landlords trying to make money out of small spaces in their home, with wild stipulations attached]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/14/12/5942ea1936e9e3c4b525b2dae7ac07bfY29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNzM2OTQxMTE5-2.77508859.jpg)
When the yearly tenancy ends and I’ve got a matter of months to find somewhere new to live, I become abrasive, uncompromising and, well, unbearable. I dedicate every waking hour to finding a flat, my phone is programmed to ping each time a new property is added to Rightmove and my social life becomes non-existent so that I’m free to attend an impromptu viewing at any given moment.
![[‘People are being treated like an income stream rather than human beings,’ says Jae Vail, a spokesperson for the London Renters Union]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2023/08/03/06/406236ce7ee8cf119782da9bfa0b9973Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNjkxMDg5NzQx-2.73130011.jpg)
These stories are part of what’s become a universal experience. Eleanor, 26, tells me of her horrifying search for a four-bed property in east London with three of her friends, each with fairly realistic budgets of £800-£900 per month. Between the four of them, they viewed more than 30 properties and it took three months to finally sign a tenancy agreement. In that time, it impacted Eleanor’s mental health, and relations between her housemates began to sour. “We had a Google sheet that we added all of the properties to and were turning up to viewings where you would have to queue around the block,” she recalls, exasperated. “It was a really awful time. We had arguments and nearly called off living together because it was such a relentlessly stressful time.”.
