The cheapest areas to rent in the UK, as experts forecast price changes in the next year

According to Right Move data, the average rent outside London reached a new high in the third quarter of 2022.

In London, where average prices increased to £2,480 and inner-London rentals reached £3,000 for the first time, tenants were being asked to pay £1,172 per month on average in the rest of the UK.

The cheapest places to rent in the UK are now highlighted by separate Hamptons statistics, as are the places where rents are rising the quickest.

We look at the cheapest, and most expensive, areas to rent in the UK.

Cheapest places to rent

Wales is the cheapest place in the UK to rent, as the average cost of renting a new let doesn’t exceed £800.

North of England comes in second, as the average cost of renting a newly let property has recently risen to £800.

Rent in Scotland, which was at £750 before, has recently risen to £820.

The Midlands experienced the largest proportional increase, with rents rising by 11.2 per cent from £777 to £864. Despite that, it still remains one of the cheapest places in England for rent.

Most expensive places to rent

The smallest proportional change was in the East of England, where prices increased by 4.1 per cent from £1,097 to £1,143, becoming an expensive place to rent in the UK.

Inner London, Greater London, and Outer London remain the most expensive regions to rent in the UK - they all saw a large increase of at least £150.

In certain areas of London, the cost of renting a room has increased by more than a third in the past year.

In the fourth quarter of 2022, tenants in the W7 and SW20 postcodes paid 34 per cent more than they had at the end of 2021.

Rent in South-East England has risen to £1,100, making it the fourth-most expensive region in the UK to rent.

Tim Bannister, director of property science at Rightmove, forecasted that rents will rise by an additional five per cent this year, which is three per cent more than the increases seen in the five years before the pandemic.

He said: “Although the fierce competition among tenants to find a home is starting to ease, it is still double the level it was back in 2019.

“Letting agents are seeing extremely high volumes of tenant inquiries and dealing with tens of potential tenants for each available property.”