Top 3 Best Places to Be a Landlord in the UK

August 26, 2026

These are the 3 best cities to be a landlord, according to landlords.

Landlord Resource have analysed Zoopla data to identify the UK’s highest-yielding buy-to-let locations and share top tips to find the right rental area for a return on investment.

The top 3 highest-yielding buy-to-let cities in the UK revealed:

Rank

City

Average Monthly Rent

Average Price

Average Gross Rental Yield

1

Sunderland

£659

£84,924

9.3%

2

Aberdeen

£734

£106,170

8.3%

3

Burnley

£634

£92,473

8.2%

The average gross rental yield is 3.5% higher in Sunderland than the UK average:

Sunderland has the highest average gross yield of 9.3% – a rate that is also 1% higher than in any other UK city. Rents in Sunderland (£659) are less than half the rent you would find in London.

Buy-to-let regional yields showcase an extreme North-South divide:

Major UK cities such as Dundee, Middlesbrough, Hull, Glasgow, Liverpool, and Newcastle also sneak into the top 10, and this reflects a pattern of Scottish and Northern English dominance in this ranking.

In fact, the North East posts the top regional yield, at 7.9%. Scotland (7.9%) and the North West follow in 2nd and 3rd respectively.

Saif Derzi, Property Advisor at Landlord Resource, has shared advice on how Brits should approach buy-to-let investments in 2026:

“There’s lots of information out there when it comes to picking the right location for a buy-to-let property, and it can be overwhelming knowing who to trust. Before basing your buying preferences on a yield figure, you should cross-check at least two independent sources – this could include a housing portal and a lending tracker.

“While the latest data suggests that buy-to-let opportunity in the North is great for a return on investment, it will cost you growth as a result. Typically, housing prices in Southern England have risen nearly twice as fast in the past decade as compared with northern counterparts.

“For those looking to pick an area imminently, they should note that city-level rankings are too coarse to buy on. You need to be honing in on exact locations, and the yield gaps between different city locations and local areas can be extreme.”

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