Private renting considered affordable in Milton Keynes as tenants across England face “the most back-breaking costs”

Private renting costs in Milton Keynes are considerably more affordable than the UK’s average renting costs, new figures show.

The campaign group Generation Rent said renters across England and Wales are "facing the most backbreaking costs" and urged the Government to intervene.

Figures from the Office for National Statistics show private renters on a median wage in Milton Keynes could expect to spend 27% of their income on the area's average-priced rented home in 2023-24.

This has gone down from 29% a year earlier, and also slightly lower than the 28% in 2015-16, when records began.

It was also lower than the average of 30% across the South East.

Mairi MacRae, director of campaigns and policy at Shelter, said: "Millions of people are forced to rely on an increasingly unaffordable private rental market, where costs have spiralled out of control.

"Across the country, private rents are swallowing up huge proportions of people’s incomes. Many are unable to save for the future, while others are forced to skip meals and cut back on essentials just to keep afloat.

"With little preventing landlords hiking the rent, families who can no longer keep up are being pushed into homelessness in grotty and unstable temporary accommodation."

Across England, private renters could expect to spend 36% of their income on the average rent.

An area is considered "affordable" if a private-renting household would spend the equivalent of 30% or less of their gross income on rent.

Francesca Albanese from the homelessness charity Crisis said renters are "overburdened with rental costs".

She added: "What these statistics don’t show clearly is that the impact falls hardest on people with the lowest incomes.”

"Households on the lowest incomes are having to spend increasingly large proportions of their incomes on rent, often foregoing other essentials – from food to gas and electricity – to make ends meet.”

She urged the Government to unfreeze housing benefit in the Autumn Budget, and to "deliver on its promise to build thousands of new homes for social rent".

A Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesperson said: "We know the rental market needs to be made fairer and that's why through our Renters’ Rights Bill we will empower tenants to challenge excessive rent hikes, end unfair bidding wars, and cap advance payments to one month's rent.

"Key to reducing rents is also through boosting supply, which is why through our Plan for Change we will deliver 1.5 million homes, including the biggest increase in social and affordable housebuilding in a generation, backed by £39 billion investment."