Hello and welcome to a special episode of Women of Balls, where I Cato Balls talk to today's trailblazers.

Today's panel is sponsored by Lloyd's Banking Group.

The cost of living is rising, as is the cost of renting.

Zouple estimates that rents are rising at the fastest rate in 14 years, which means that the average rent of the UK is now over £1,000 a month.

This is partly a pandemic effect, especially in London as people return to offices.

But COVID has also shaken people's financial securities.

The Citizens' Advice Bureau found that more than one and three renters felt insecure about their inability to stay in their tenancy during the pandemic and when were disproportionately impacted

during the pandemic. Mothers were more likely to be put on furlough or even lose their jobs.

Rising price is not the only problem with the UK's private rentals market. Slow or unethical

landlords, unsafe properties or short-term tenancies

are all problems faced by renters. What more can be done for the almost 5 million private

renters in the UK? To discuss, I'm Joaquin Nicky Aitken, the Conservative MP for cities of London

and Westminster. Karen Buck, the Labour MP for Westminster North, who's also the vice chair

for the all-party parliamentary group on the private rental sector, and Esther Dexter, managing director of intermediaries at Lloyd's Banking Group, who are kindly sponsoring this podcast.

To begin, Esther, I wonder if you could just lay out for listeners the challenges in 2022 for UK renters.

I think for everybody it's been a real challenge in terms of the rise in rent, as you

already mentioned in your introduction. And what we've established with research in 2021, you

pay on average £1,400 more per annum if you're renting than if you had bought and home.

So that's a real challenge. That's about £115 per month.

Nikki, how do you think the market or, I suppose, the situation for rent is changed over the past decade?

I certainly think that short-term letting like Airbnb and that type of platforms have had a serious

effect on the rental market. Landlords are choosing to rent out their homes on a nightly basis

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