New research from The Mortgage Works has put a number on something a lot of landlords already sense: far more are heading for the exit than are coming in. In its Q2 2026 Buy to Let Market Barometer, 43% of landlords say they intend to sell a property in the next 12 months. Only 6% intend to buy. That’s planned selling activity running at more than seven times the rate of planned buying.
The wider picture from the same survey
The barometer, based on responses from NRLA members across the UK, points the same way on a few other measures. Landlord confidence has weakened year-on-year: fewer landlords now rate their prospects for rental yields, their own lettings business, and future capital gains as good over the next three months than did a year ago. The proportion of landlords who raised rents in the last 12 months has also eased, down to 63%, against 69% a year earlier and 74% two years earlier. Rents are still going up more often than not. They’re just going up less often than they were.
Among leveraged landlords, 40% expect to remortgage or arrange a product transfer in the next year, so plenty of people are managing existing borrowing even while few are adding to it. Of the smaller group who do intend to buy, 64% plan to do it through a limited company and 48% expect to use buy to let finance. The average landlord in the survey holds 7.2 properties, achieves a gross yield of 6.4%, and just over half (51%) have at least one buy to let mortgage.
Why the gap is so wide
The survey doesn’t ask landlords to give their reasons, so anything beyond the numbers is reading between the lines. But it’s not hard to see what’s been stacking up for landlords over the past few years: mortgage interest relief for individually owned property was tapered away some time ago, energy efficiency rules for rented homes have been under discussion, and the Renters’ Rights Act has changed how tenancies work. Any one of those on its own might not move someone to sell. Several arriving in the same stretch of years plainly has.
Is 43% as alarming as it sounds
Worth being careful here. This is intention data, landlords saying what they plan to do, not a count of completed sales or new listings. Surveys like this tend to run ahead of what actually happens; plenty of landlords who tell a researcher they’re thinking of selling will still be landlords in 12 months’ time. So 43% isn’t a forecast of the private rented sector shrinking by nearly half. It’s a measure of sentiment, and right now that sentiment has tipped a long way toward the door.
That said, a gap this wide between intending sellers and intending buyers, even allowing for some of it not converting into real transactions, points to fewer landlords in the sector over time rather than more. I’ve written a fuller breakdown of the confidence figures, profitability, and regional rental yields from this same barometer in my earlier piece on the Q2 2026 buy to let data, if you want the wider context.
What it could mean for tenants
Fewer landlords buying while a much larger group are selling should, in theory, shrink the pool of rented homes over time and put upward pressure on rents. But the same barometer shows rent rises actually slowing, not accelerating, which suggests any tightening in supply hasn’t shown up in pricing yet, or is being offset by something else in the market. It’s a genuine tension in the data rather than a story that resolves neatly, and it’s one worth watching over the next couple of barometers rather than reading too much into a single quarter.
If you’re a landlord weighing up your own next move
Whether selling, buying, or remortgaging makes sense for you depends on your own portfolio, your mortgage terms, and what you’re actually trying to achieve, which a market survey can’t answer. If you want to talk through where your buy to let borrowing stands, get in touch.
This article is for information only and does not constitute financial or tax advice. Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on a mortgage secured against it. Tax treatment depends on individual circumstances and may be subject to change; speak to an accountant about limited company or capital gains questions.