‘I’m so tired of London’s rental bidding wars’

The last few months have contained so many ups and downs, as I struggle to find work and a place to live. I’m a history of art graduate, having done my undergraduate degree at the University of Leeds and then a master’s at the Courtauld institute in London, but I had to leave my last job as a gallery assistant at a London art gallery suddenly at the end of last December and then couldn’t immediately find anything else [says Maya Tracey, 25].
I had to deliberate for a long time before deciding whether to leave the job, as I had to take into account how expensive living in London has become and how I would manage this in practical terms, but in the end I felt I had no choice.
I was without work for almost four months until April, when I found a temporary job in a completely different field. This gap in employment has been difficult for me and I have had to fundamentally change exciting study plans I had made for the next few years, as I could no longer afford to do them. I saw recent research from Scottish Widows that one in ten people could last only a month financially supporting themselves if they were not able to work. That wasn’t me, but it has certainly been tight.
At the same time as all of this, I have experienced the strain of renting as a young person in London. For five months I had been living with two of my friends in a house in Balham, southwest London, paying £915 per month for my room, but the house has now suddenly been put up for sale by the landlord. I’m hoping it isn’t going to sell too quickly as I don’t have a clue where to go next.
I’d like, theoretically, to look at moving in somewhere with my partner, but I know it’s going to be difficult in a London rental market that is so overheated that when I’ve looked for previous properties, I’ve had to compete with dozens of others in bidding wars.
Like many other young people I know living in London, I’ve struggled to build up a financial reserve that will enable me to put a deposit down on another property when the time comes to move out of this one. This was only worsened by the period of time I had out of work earlier this year.
In a practical sense, this means I will only be able to put a deposit down on another place when I get the deposit back that I have on this one — but I won’t get that back until I leave this house. So it’s a bit of a Catch-22 situation.
I have lots of friends in the rental market here who are in the same situation as me. There’s no housing security for us and we feel incredibly vulnerable to being evicted if our landlord sells — as many seem to be doing at the moment. Plus money is tight and rent is more expensive than ever.
According to figures I’ve seen from the rental platform Hello Neighbour, there have been 52 viewing requests on average for every property they advertised in July. Plus, the average rent in July in London was £2,452 — and up 14 per cent compared to the previous three months. I have no idea how we’d afford something like that, even if we split it.
It feels as though the only way I’ll get around this problem is by finding a friend or relative to stay with to bridge the gap, which may mean moving further away from my place of work — maybe even to the West Country where my parents live.
• ‘Magic up the money or get out’ — rents rocket since 2023
It’s a situation that would mean spending more on commuting to and from work — which, as anyone who commutes in London on a daily basis will know, is already a significant expense. We’re also considering giving up and living abroad for a while. I’ve lived in the Netherlands before and I really loved it. But I’m open to somewhere else too.
This situation might transpire pretty quickly. We have another viewing at our rental house tomorrow. We’re kind of hoping the prospective buyer hates it, but that’s not something we can control.
Like almost all of my friends, the idea of being able to afford a deposit to buy a place at the moment is just out of the question — it’s an absolute pipe dream. I’ll have no choice but to keep on renting for the foreseeable future.
My long-term career ambition is to be a museum curator and ultimately I’d love to stay in London to achieve my dream, but the reality is that, at the moment, it’s looking unlikely.