A History of Landlords

For this blog post we thought we’d take a trip back in time and share with our readers a brief history of landlording. You may have never given much thought to the history of landlording but its history holds some surprising facts.

You may be surprised to learn that landlording in a basic form extends as far back as the Roman Empire. This system, known as the manorial system (created under the Romans) became popular in the 5th century when peasants became bound to the land and dependant on landlords for protection.  This system developed into the feudal system which led to knights becoming rulers of small areas of land.

A big change which still has influence on England and Wales’ landlords today was the statute of Quia Emptores which allowed the purchase and sale of land. This still regulates the transfer of land today!

Up until the mid 1910’s approximately 90 per cent of all the housing in Britain was privately rented. The rental figures have seen a dramatic decline since then, owing much to the change in social trends and new legislation which shifted the balance of power from the landlord to the tenant.

Today the rental market has witnessed somewhat of a revival with it now being predicted that the privately rented sector will reach 20% of the total housing market by 2020.