ABSTRACT
In the property market slump of the early 1990s many buildings in Britain, particularly offices in the City of London, became “over-rented”. In other words the rent which the tenant paid was above the current rental value of the building: the rent it would have achieved if let in the open market at the time. The problem grew more acute as the property market’s problems deepened and rental values in many areas tumbled. It was a problem with which valuers had rarely had to contend since the property collapse of the mid-1970s, and it surfaced in the early 1990s in considerably more acute form and looked set to last considerably longer.
