A survey held by a specialist buy to lender shows that rented homes' standards have improved massively over the last ten years, in spite of numbers of private rented accommodation increasing by nearly half.

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The buy to lender quotes figures from the Office for National Statistics and that the proportion of rented homes classed as non-decent has dropped every year since 2008 down to 24.5% in 2018 from 44% ten years ago.

The PRS has added 1.5 million homes since 2008 which represents a growth of 45%.

No doubt due to the improvement in standards of accommodation, the English Housing Survey shows that a massive majority - 84% - of tenants were happy with their rented home.

The buy-to-let lender surveyed over 700 BTL investors and found that 70% of landlords, who carried out refurbishments in the last couple of years, did so to improve their properties to make them more attractive to tenants.

45% of landlords who undertook refurbishments did so to increase their property's yield and/or capital.

The lender's report shows that on average landlords would spend around £12,000 for each refurbishment, whilst those who undertook what is classed as ‘heavy refurbishment’, would spend as much as £40,000.

Any type of refurbishment will boost a property's rental value and income with 74% of landlords who refurbished a property reporting it had bolstered the property's value, and 82% had increased the rent.

The typical refurbishment cost of £12- 13,000 will more than likely raise the value of a property by at least the same amount.

Darrell Walker, head of sales for the specialist buy to let lender, said: “It may be an easy target for political point-scoring, but the private rented sector has been a success story since the financial crisis, catering for a growing proportion of the population that either cannot or chooses not to purchase a home. As the [sector] has grown, it has also professionalised. As it has done so, the standard of accommodation for tenants has improved drastically too.