The death of buy-to-let property is a useful cautionary tale for all investors

Investing in buy-to-let property was once a perfectly valid thing to do. But the government killed the market. John Stepek explains what investors should learn from the fate of the amateur landlord.

Property to let signs © Christopher Furlong/Getty Images
Buy to let is no longer worth it © Getty
(Image credit: Property to let signs © Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Life has become very tough for amateur landlords in recent years. Tax changes, tighter regulations, lending restrictions you name it, the buy-to-let property sector has been hit by it. But one entity is very happy indeed about the squeeze on landlords: the UK government.

How George Osborne killed the buy-to-let property market

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John Stepek

John Stepek is a senior reporter at Bloomberg News and a former editor of MoneyWeek magazine. He graduated from Strathclyde University with a degree in psychology in 1996 and has always been fascinated by the gap between the way the market works in theory and the way it works in practice, and by how our deep-rooted instincts work against our best interests as investors.

He started out in journalism by writing articles about the specific business challenges facing family firms. In 2003, he took a job on the finance desk of Teletext, where he spent two years covering the markets and breaking financial news.

His work has been published in Families in Business, Shares magazine, Spear's Magazine, The Sunday Times, and The Spectator among others. He has also appeared as an expert commentator on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, BBC Radio Scotland, Newsnight, Daily Politics and Bloomberg. His first book, on contrarian investing, The Sceptical Investor, was released in March 2019. You can follow John on Twitter at @john_stepek.