2025/26 Council Housing Rent Consultation

Every year the City of Edinburgh Council consults its tenants regarding the Housing service.  With a five-year rent strategy approved by the Council in February 2024, this year’s consultation asked tenants for their views on how their rent is spent and what their key investment priorities are. 

Tenants were presented with six core investment commitments that the Housing service want to deliver and were asked to rank them in the order they think they should be prioritised, and to provide comment on their ranking and/or the investment priorities.

Tenants were also asked if they were aware of the five-year rent strategy agreed last year and to provide any additional comments they may have about the rent strategy.

Finally, with many tenants still experiencing financial pressures because of the ongoing cost-of-living crisis, the consultation asked if tenants had found it more difficult to pay their rent in the last 12 months.  Where applicable, tenants were also asked about their experiences when seeking advice and support.  Suggestions for improvement were sought from all respondents on how we could do more in terms of financial advice and support.

We received 773 responses through our online and postal survey, which equals just over 4% of all Council tenants.

Tenants were given six investment priorities and were asked to rank them in order of preference.  The result was as follows:

1^st - Deliver and improve housing management and repairs and maintenance services

2^nd - Build more new social rented homes

3^rd - Improve energy efficiency standards of existing homes and meet net zero targets

4^th - Deliver improvement in mixed tenure blocks to make them more warm, modern and secure

5^th - Improve wider estates for areas surrounding our homes

6^th - Support and enable large scale regeneration of strategic importance to the city

Additional comments made by tenants on their investment priorities showed that there was strong support for upgrading properties both inside (windows, kitchens, boilers etc) and outside (gutters, harling etc).  Improvements to the repairs service, better insultation, and dealing with damp/mould issues were also popular themes identified by the consultation.

68% of tenants who responded to the consultation were not aware of the approved five-year rent strategy.  The additional comments to this question showed many tenants felt that rent increases should be linked with property conditions.

The consultation also found that 39.8% (308) of the respondents had found it more difficult to pay their rent over the last 12 months, and 39.8% (124) of them had sought advice or help to assist with paying the rents.  For those who had sought advice or help, nearly 40% were very or fairly satisfied that the assistance they received met their needs.

To improve this advice and help, tenants said that it was important to make people aware of the support available, with better communication and better accessibility.  Tenants said that help should also be provided to those tenants who do not get benefits, and personal circumstances should be taken into account when help is given or not. 

(*Please note, not all tenants answered all of the questions)

The Housing Revenue Account (HRA) Budget Strategy 2025-26 to 2034-35 was considered by City of Edinburgh Council at its budget meeting on 20 February 2025. 

At the budget meeting, Councillors agreed to increase rent by 7% in 2025/26, which is the second year of the five-year rent strategy agreed by the Council in last year’s budget, and to continue with the rent increase assumptions for the following five years from 2029/30 to 2033/34.

Council also agreed to continue to help with the ongoing cost of living challenges experienced by tenants by increasing funding for the Tenant Hardship Fund, to help support tenants experiencing financial hardship.

And in line with the consultation results, Council agreed that investment priority should be given to improving existing homes.