The coming decade is expected to bring a growing demand for rented accommodation as people find it increasingly difficult to get on to the housing ladder. The proportion of owner-occupied homes in England has fallen from 71 per cent in 2003 to 68.3 per cent today, according to the Department for Communities and Local Government's Survey of English Housing.

This fall has been chiefly in the number of owners with mortgages – a result of the decline of the traditional first-time buyer.

The number of mortgaged owner-occupiers fell from 8.6m in 2000 to 7.9m in 2008 – a number that is likely to have increased since as a result of the credit crunch – and last month housing minister John Healey declared the era of Britons aspiring to own their own home might be coming to an end.