The Quartermile development has been a massive success story for Edinburgh. There are almost 800 apartments within the development and around half of these are owned by investors and let out to professional or student tenants. Quartermile couldn’t be better placed for professional tenants working in the offices around Lothian Road and Morrison Street and for those working at any of the high profile businesses based within Quartermile itself. For students studying at Edinburgh University, the development has that ‘on campus’ feel with the main hub of the Uni just across Middle Meadow Walk. Average rents for 1-bedroom (£1,273pcm) and 2-bedroom (£2,006pcm) apartments are considerably higher than the Edinburgh average (£720 and £1,109 respectively).

Rent levels vary over the course of the year

Rent levels within Quartermile vary at different times of the year depending on tenant demand. It’s helpful to shine a light on this by looking at 1-bedroom and 2-bedroom rents over a number of years to establish if any patterns emerged. By using quarterly rental evidence since 2013 provided by Citylets, rents during the course of the year can be analyses to help investors and agents maximise rents and minimise voids throughout the year.

 

Some highlights

  • There is a clear pattern in the charts with rents growing/peaking in the summer months (yellow) flattening off/declining over the winter (blue)
  • The cycle is less bumpy for 1 bedroom properties which tend to be in are more consistent demand throughout the year, albeit still with visible peaks and troughs in line with the pattern for 2-bedroom properties
  • Q3 each year tends to perform very well as students return to Edinburgh Looking to move into accommodation next to the University around August/September
  • There are exceptions to the patterns, marked as red dots, when new apartments were released to the market (these always command a premium as tenants are drawn towards the brand-new)
  • There is a general upward trend for both sizes of properties over the past 5 years

Conclusion

Landlords with Quartermile properties should be prepared to accept lower rents over winter months to avoid properties sitting vacant. The highest rents tend to be achieved late Q2 and Q3 so, where possible landlords should aim for tenancies to fall into a cycle of coming up for let in the busier summer months (albeit this cannot be guaranteed under the new PRT legislation). The last of the apartments sold at Quartermile have now been handed over so it will be interesting to watch how rents perform over the coming winter months, without any new properties being launched to the lettings market. Now that the supply of properties within the development has been capped and with Edinburgh University’s ‘Futures Institute’ moving into Quartermile in 2021 we would expect capital and rental values to grow as demand for apartments within the development strengthens.