Choosing flooring carefully in the first instance can save you money and hassle if problems occur further down the line. Here are four top tips for choosing flooring options for your rental investment property.

1. If you’re buying carpet, then don’t be tempted to buy an expensive brand. Instead, choose carpet that is reasonably priced and hard wearing. Many carpet companies have end of line or end of roll carpets that are priced at a lower cost and are a good option to explore if you only have a small room or two to carpet.

2. If you’re buying tiles for a bathroom or kitchen floor, try and buy a few extra to keep as spares in case any of them get damaged or stained. It’s much easier just to remove a few tiles and replace them with new ones, than have to replace a whole carpet.

3. Don’t even think about putting carpet in a bathroom. It’s impractical, not so easy to clean and is takes ages to dry if it accidently gets wet. Instead, choose non-slip tiles or vinyl that is more hygienic and more appropriate for a modern bathroom.

4. Wooden floors look stylish, but a more cost-effective modern flooring solution is laminate. It’s easier for tenants to keep clean and is relatively easy to replace if damage occurs.

Map of London rental prices

If you’ve got rental properties in London, or are thinking of investing in property in the area during 2010, then you can now gain an important insight into rental property prices in the capital.

London Mayor, Boris Johnson, has launched London Rents, a website providing a look the rents achieved at properties across London. Although still in its early stages, the site currently has rental prices for about 11,009 properties in the capital and provides useful information about the average cost of renting a property. The information has been gathered from a sample of private tenancies created over the last 12 months and the aim is to update the information on a monthly basis.

With regular details being uploaded onto the site, it should give a fairly accurate picture of the state of property rentals in London.

The site is a treasure trove of information for landlords as well as tenants If you’re not familiar with the city, then the colour-coded map of rental prices provides valuable information about the areas where the highest and lowest rents can be gained, which could help in your decision-making process of where to buy rental property.

For example, Dartford is currently shown as the cheapest place to rent, where the rental price of a two bedroom property averages out as about £160 per week. The most expensive area in London is South Kensington, where the landlord of a two bedroom property gets an average of £625 per week.

With London being of the largest private rental sectors in England, with over 650,000 properties available for rent, the site looks promising so far and we look forward to seeing how it progresses over the months to come.

What do you think? Will the site be useful for your property rental business?