Whether buy to let is still worth it is now one of the most asked property questions in the country, and the short answer is that the averages have stopped meaning anything. The same year produced heavy landlord exits and record advertised rents, a sixth rate hold in a row and, on one measure, more rental stock than a year earlier. Both the it-is-dead camp and the never-better camp can quote real numbers. What decides it is borrowing: with little or no mortgage, higher-yield stock can still pay, while a buyer borrowing to the limit on a low-yield flat usually cannot make the sums work.
In short
- Advertised rents are at record levels while landlords keep leaving; the claim that exits are accelerating runs against recent listings data.
- Bank Rate has been held at 3.75% six times in a row, most recently on 17 September 2026; the average two-year fixed buy-to-let rate at 75% loan to value was 5.27% on 1 August 2026.
- A £150,000 northern terrace can still net around 5.5% before finance; a £350,000 southern flat, at perhaps 3.5% net, cannot carry today’s debt at all.
- The model still works for low-leverage buyers and for high-yield stock whose net income covers the debt, including in company structures; it fails for the classic one-property, max-mortgage, southern-flat buyer.
- Run your own numbers stressed at today’s debt with no growth assumed, not the market average.
So this piece does the unfashionable thing and holds the conflicting data side by side, then answers the question the only way it can be answered: worth it for whom.
The exit data cuts both ways
The exits are real. TwentyEA, which sells property data to agents, puts the number of rental properties that left the sector across the UK in 2025 at around 181,000. Property118’s second-quarter landlord survey of 2,096 landlords found 27% planning to quit entirely within three years, though a self-selecting survey of a landlord forum’s own readers is not a representative sample of the sector.
The acceleration is the contested part. Hamptons, an estate agency owned by the Connells Group, reported that 9.2% of homes listed for sale in June 2026 had been advertised for rent within the previous five years, down from 11.3% a year earlier. TwentyCi, a data firm that sells property market intelligence to agents and lenders, said June 2026 brought the first year-on-year increase in available rental stock in five years, with build-to-rent listings up 22% in the second quarter.
The fair reading is that a multi-year exit of leveraged individual landlords genuinely happened, while the claim that it is speeding up runs against the most recent listing data.
Rents and rates set the frame
On the income side, advertised rents sit at record levels, a squeeze we covered in our note on the rental supply fall. Rightmove’s second-quarter tracker put the average advertised rent outside London at a record £1,397 a month and in London at a record £2,791. On a different measure, of rents largely already agreed rather than advertised, the ONS put average UK private rent at £1,400 a month in August 2026, up 3.8% on a year earlier. The supply measures diverge by what they count: TwentyCi’s figures include build to rent, while Rightmove, the property portal, found the number of homes available to rent 1% lower than a year earlier, which is how rising-supply and record-rent headlines coexist.
On the cost side, the Bank of England held Bank Rate at 3.75% on 17 September 2026, its sixth hold in a row. Three of the nine members again voted to raise it to 4%, as in July, up from two in June and one in April. Its next decision is due on 5 November 2026.
Cheap money is not coming back on any timetable a deal should rely on. Moneyfacts, which runs a mortgage comparison site, found the average two-year fixed buy-to-let rate across all loan to values rose from 4.66% on 1 March 2026 to 5.44% on 1 April, and put the 75% loan to value average at 5.27% on 1 August. Rightmove, the property portal, publishes a separate buy-to-let rate tracker compiled by Podium; in its 30 September update it showed an average of 6.02% for 75% loan to value two-year fixes with no product fee. The two measures are built differently and are not directly comparable, and the Moneyfacts figure above is dated 1 August.
High rents and expensive debt in the same market is exactly the combination that splits the answer by buyer type.
The arithmetic for a 2026 buyer
Run deliberately round, illustrative numbers. A £150,000 northern terrace letting at £950 a month grosses 7.6%. After realistic running costs, the sort we itemise in our gross versus net guide, call it 5.5% net before finance.
A cash buyer banks that. A buyer with 75% debt at the 5.27% average pays most of the net income to the lender and holds a thin margin that one void or one boiler erases.
Reverse the postcode and the sums invert: a £350,000 southern flat at £1,500 a month grosses 5.1%, nets perhaps 3.5%, and cannot carry today’s debt at all.
£150,000 northern terrace, £950 a month
About 5.5% net
£350,000 southern flat, £1,500 a month
Perhaps 3.5% net
Borrowing now decides whether a deal works at all, rather than simply boosting the return.
Who still fits buy to let in 2026
Still works
The model still works, sometimes very well, for buyers with modest or no leverage, for company structures that keep full interest relief where the net yield covers the interest, a distinction our Section 24 guide explains, and for anyone buying high-yield stock at prices that reflect where the market has settled.
Does not work
It does not work for the marginal buyer it was built on in the 2010s: one property, maximum mortgage, southern flat, personal name.
For that buyer the arithmetic fails before the tax bill arrives. The Finance Act 2026 sets property income rates of 22%, 42% and 47% from April 2027 for individual landlords in England and Northern Ireland, which tilts the individual-versus-company balance further still. Scottish taxpayers pay Scottish rates on property income.
The irony of the exodus is that the sellers and the buyers are both right. The people leaving are the people the model no longer fits. The people buying are the people it still fits.
What this means for property investors
Stop asking whether buy to let is worth it in general and run your own version: your cash, your rate, your tax position, net yield after honest costs, stressed at today’s debt with no growth assumed.
If the deal clears that test, it can work whatever the headlines say. If it only clears the test with optimistic rent growth and a rate-cut assumption, you are the marginal buyer the last cycle burned.
If you are buying, browse the current stock at our live listings or join the insider list to see high yield deals before they reach the market.
If you already own buy to let that no longer clears that test, see when to sell your buy to let and when to keep it, or get a free desktop valuation: an evidence-backed range within 24 hours, yours whether you sell or not.
This is general information, not advice on your position, so take independent advice before acting.