Managed rental growth: Plan A for profitability in 2026

Rental agencies have a clear plan for growth in 2026: sign more landlords – specifically, under fully managed contracts.

In PayProp’s latest State of the Rental Industry survey, 58.9% of respondents picked signing more landlords as their biggest priority for 2026. And a massive 67.6% said that increasing their number of managed rentals is their main profitability strategy.

Delivering growth

Managed rental growth has been a priority for rental agencies for several years, and the share of rentals under full management has been growing steadily.

In our latest survey, 88.9% of respondents fully managed at least half the rental properties on their books, up from 85.9% last year.

Their strategy is backed up by solid market fundamentals: 43.1% of agents surveyed by PayProp reported lower-than-usual vacancy rates, and most properties are let within two to four weeks. Strong tenant retention also locks in steady income for landlords and agents.

"Optimism is justified – there’s no shortage of opportunity currently,” says Michelle Dickens from PayProp. “However, growth is no longer driven just by market conditions. Strained tenant affordability is acting as a brake on growth, so agencies will need to be far more deliberate in how they structure, price and scale their businesses to stay sustainable.”

With housing supply constrained and rising interest rates deterring investment, agencies may find it harder to secure more managed rental stock. That will favour those agencies with a plan to grow and develop their fully managed rental portfolios.  

Currently, less than half of our survey respondents dedicate a specific budget to managed rental growth. More than a third (35.5%) don’t yet have a tailor-made sales presentation for negotiating rental mandates, making it harder for agents to promote them to landlords.  

If competition ratchets up, they risk losing mandates to better-prepared competitors.

Leading agencies are:

• Prioritising managed rentals

• Equipping agents with specific marketing materials promoting managed mandates

• Sometimes: offering tiered pricing or add-on services to unlock new income streams

To find out more about agencies’ 2026 growth strategies, use of technology and more, read our State of the Rental Industry report.