Rent Setting & Optimisation Manager

Rent Setting & Optimisation Manager
Interim Contract | East London | Hybrid

We are currently supporting a well-established housing organisation serving communities across East London, with a strong focus on providing high-quality, affordable homes and delivering positive outcomes for residents.

They are looking for an experienced Rent Setting & Optimisation Manager to take ownership of the organisation's rent-setting function and provide specialist technical expertise, assurance and advice across the business.

This is a specialist role within a small and developing Income function, with no direct line management responsibility. Instead, you will act as the technical lead for rent setting, working closely with Finance, Housing, Customer Services, Complaints and Income colleagues.

The Role

The immediate priority will be the successful delivery of the 2027/28 annual rent-setting exercise, ensuring rents are accurately calculated, compliant and correctly implemented across all relevant tenures.

You will be responsible for:

• Leading the end-to-end 2027/28 rent-setting exercise across relevant tenures.
• Applying the appropriate rent-setting methodology for social rent and other tenures.
• Calculating and validating formula rents, rent caps, rent flexibility and annual increases.
• Ensuring rent calculations comply with the Rent Standard, legislation, regulatory requirements, government guidance and occupancy agreements.
• Reviewing rent rolls to identify anomalies, incorrect rents, missing data and potential compliance issues.
• Maintaining a robust audit trail of calculations, assumptions, decisions and approvals.
• Monitoring legislative and regulatory changes and assessing their impact on rent-setting arrangements.
• Providing specialist technical advice to colleagues and senior managers.
• Working with Finance and system teams to ensure approved rents are accurately implemented.
• Undertaking reconciliations, quality checks and pre- and post-implementation testing.
• Investigating historic rent anomalies and recommending corrective action.
• Supporting income forecasting and budget setting with accurate rent data.
• Working collaboratively across Housing, Finance, Customer Services and Complaints.
• Supporting clear and consistent customer communications around rent changes.

About You

We are looking for an experienced rent-setting specialist from a social housing environment who can confidently take ownership of the function and get into the detail.

You will need:

• Significant experience of rent setting within social housing.
• Strong knowledge of the Rent Standard, formula rents, rent caps, rent flexibility and annual rent increases.
• Understanding of social rent and other relevant rent regimes.
• Knowledge of tenancy, lease and occupancy agreements and their impact on rent.
• Experience interpreting and implementing legislative, regulatory and policy changes.
• Strong analytical, numerical and reconciliation skills.
• Advanced Excel and data manipulation skills.
• The ability to translate complex technical requirements into practical processes.
• Excellent communication skills and the confidence to provide clear technical advice.

Experience within a housing association or local authority, rent policy development and housing/finance systems would be advantageous. Experience using MRI/Orchard is also desirable.

The Person

This role would suit someone who is technically confident, analytical and highly detail-focused, with the curiosity to investigate anomalies and challenge information where necessary.

You will be comfortable working independently, taking ownership and getting stuck into the detail, while also being able to build effective relationships across Finance, Housing and operational teams.

Most importantly, you will be someone who understands the impact that rent-setting decisions have on residents and is committed to getting things right.

Why This Role?

This is an opportunity to take genuine ownership of a specialist rent-setting function at an important point in its development. Alongside delivering the 2027/28 rent-setting exercise, you will help strengthen processes, controls and data quality to improve future annual rent-setting exercises and support accurate income forecasting.

If you are an experienced social housing rent-setting professional looking for a role where your technical expertise will have real influence, we'd be keen to hear from you.