The importance of brand value in single-family rental

In a world where brands are a shorthand for trust, coherent identities are an essential tool in a successful single-family platform 

- says Jack Wright, Head of Marketing & Sustainability at Ascend.

Which brands do you identify with? Maybe you prefer a particular make of trainer, or feel that a certain car marque is just ‘more you’. Perhaps certain companies reflect your opinions, or loyalty schemes determine where you shop. We live in a time when almost every consumer decision – from where we buy our morning coffee to the sports teams we support – is influenced by brand and the values they represent.

Brands are shorthand for trust. Successful identities tell their customers what they stand for, the service they can expect and act as a hallmark of quality. “Don’t worry,” they subconsciously tell us, “you’re in safe hands. We know what we’re doing, and what it is you’re after.” As the UK’s single-family rental (SFR) sector continues its growth, becoming an ever-more-vital pillar of the UK’s housing mix, the role of brand is increasingly important too.

Differentiating

So, why brand an SFR platform? A house is a house, right? And surely a whole raft of other factors – proximity to jobs, amenities, family and friends for example – are the real drivers for where people choose to live? Such a view misunderstands how residents make decisions and what they are looking for, especially in a market that is as much about service as the physical asset itself.

SFR’s great strengths lie in high-quality homes, professional management and security of tenure. These are all key factors behind residents choosing homes within an institutional portfolio over those operated by individual private landlords, and compared to the all-too-regular issues in the wider private rented sector these advantages are worth paying a premium for. But for these attributes to influence decisions, people first need to know about them, and that is where brand comes to the fore.

A visible and consistent brand is the foundation on which successful leasing performance is built, enabling an omnichannel approach to launching, marketing and stabilising developments and individual homes. It allows for cohesion across all consumer touchpoints – targeted online coverage, property portals, social media, legacy press, outdoor advertising and an on-site presence, to name a few – promoting lifestyle and location alongside bricks and mortar. It is also crucial in harnessing word-of-mouth, providing a trusted name that existing residents can recommend.

People find their new homes in a multitude of ways with differing levels of information; the shorthand of an established identity can cut through the noise and nudge residents towards choosing a home in your portfolio. While it is probably far-fetched to suggest that potential tenants will prioritise a home’s operational brand over more practical features such as location and price, it is undoubtedly the case that a strong profile is vital in differentiating SFR platforms from the more fragmented and inconsistent offerings across the wider rental market.

Unifying

Brands bring other advantages too. Unlike multifamily BTR developments, SFR portfolios are by their very nature more dispersed, spanning multiple postcodes, towns and regions. Delivering a consistent service and resident experience across that spread, and developing a sense of both continuity and community, is a fundamental operational challenge.

Professional and resident-focussed identities have a role to play in driving this side of a successful portfolio. The best brands act as a framework for service delivery, effectively a series of commitments that the platform needs to be held to, ensuring that tenants in different locations have the same level of resident experience and an overall sense of belonging. Brands elevate portfolios beyond being collections of homes into recognisable communities supported by a consistent promise, shaping SFR as a service-driven industry and not simply a financial asset.

But the financial aspect is clearly a priority too. Resident buy-in of this kind generates significant benefits for the platform in question, helping to foster resident loyalty and minimise churn. And as portfolios expand, the opportunities for residents to move within the brand – either within the same scheme as their families grow, or relocating to different sites – expand with them.

Supporting

Brands hold undoubted advantages, but can sometimes appear a bit ‘touchy feely’ for the hard-nosed world of yields, voids and capital growth. They also require considerable investment and expertise to launch, establish and reach their potential; for lean investors, who outsource such elements as asset and property management, brand can be a particularly sticky challenge to address.

It is an issue we are solving with Ascend Living, the white-label brand we launched in early 2025. With more than 3,500 homes currently operating under the brand, drawn from a number of separate platforms, Ascend Living gives investors the advantages of a resident-facing name without the costs associated with creating and establishing a standalone identity. Individual portfolios benefit from the scale and higher profile of a wider brand, underpinned by the operational understanding and capabilities of Ascend, ensuring high levels of service and resident experience.

The reputation of SFR platforms, and the sector as a whole, will not be defined only by the number of homes delivered, but by the experience of those that live in them. Operational branding is central to this future, playing a key role in providing residents with confidence, investors with differentiation and the market with credibility. If brands are a shorthand for trust, it is those portfolios with the most effective brands that will ultimately lead the way.