As most PR agencies and comms teams know, the week of the Autumn Statement or Budget is always a busy one! Needless to say, Building Relations PR has had a frantic but successful few days pulling comment, press releases and by-lined columns together for several of our clients.

This month we started working with online lettings agency client, Upad.co.uk and so the Chancellors decision to ban lettings fees was clearly relevant. 

autumn statement

Today Upad was featured in City AM talking about the impact that this ban on lettings fees will have on landlords, driving them online in search of better deals. The column by James Davies, Upad’s CEO and founder, was the result of a meeting that the Building Relations team had with City AM Hot Property editor and features writer, and a story that we worked on with her ahead of the AS about rental arrears being set to be the biggest problem for landlords in 2017. Other coverage opportunities have since come in from the Daily Mail and FT with James also taking part in The Sunday Times Home Twitter Hour to share his views alongside other leading industry experts. James also conducted a very successful radio interview with Share Radio.

For our York-based estate agent client, Redmove, we secured coverage in the main local paper The Press, with managing director Michael Redmond giving his view on how the ban on lettings agent fees will be a potentially crippling measure for the lettings industry, and the potential danger of already overstretched landlords relaying this cost back to the tenant by increasing rent.

Building Relations Director Kathryn Reucroft says: “Events like the Autumn Statement are great opportunities to get your own message across in the press. However, it’s also a busy time in the media landscape and lots of companies are also trying to have their say and so the fight for column inches is made even harder. To even be in with a chance of cutting through it’s essential to plan ahead, understand what you or your client hopes to achieve, make your point well and of course your little black book of contacts will never prove so valuable.”

With the Chancellor’s decision to shake up the fiscal calendar, we look forward to the Spring Statement and Autumn Budget next year, and the effect that Wednesday’s announcements will have on the property market until then.