Families need a £52,000 income 'to afford London rent' | Money | guardian.co.uk

Families need a £52,000 income 'to afford London rent' | Money | guardian.co.uk

Families need to earn at least £52,000 a year to afford to rent a two-bed home in London, according to housing charity Shelter.

The charity's Homes for London campaign analysed the cost of renting across the capital and found that a family would need to take home an average of almost £3,500 a month including benefits, equivalent to a yearly pre-tax salary of £52,000. But in eight London boroughs including Hackney and Tower Hamlets they would need to earn more than £60,000 a year.

The number of families renting from private landlords in London has increased by 70% to almost one-in-four households in the past two years. In 2011 rents rose in the city by 7%, almost double the rate of salary inflation for the average London wage.