Investment in the UK’s build-to-rent (BTR) sector totalled around £3bn in H1 in the second-strongest half year on record, with student accommodation investment surging by 77%, according to new data from JLL.

In its latest BTR market update, JLL revealed a slow start to the year, with just £736m invested in the sector in Q1, before a substantial jump in Q2 due to a spree of major acquisitions.

In total, H1 investment for BTR was up 28% year on year and 6% above the five-year average.

JLL’s data also reveals that single-family housing saw £1bn of investment across H1, marking a 7% rise year on year and up 3% on the five-year average.

Meanwhile, student accommodation investment amounted to £2.3bn, up 77% year on year and up 11% on the five-year average. Most of this was completed in Q1, including Unite’s £723m acquisition of Empiric Student Property.

Major deals across BTR included Morgan Stanley and Ridgeback’s purchase of the private rented sector arm of London & Quadrant Housing Trust for more than £1.05bn.

The firm also highlighted Greystar’s recent acquisition of 904 homes at Elephant Park for around £500m, as well as Blackstone’s sale of around 1,000 single-family homes from its Leaf Living business.

This echoes Savills’ BTR market update, published earlier this month, which revealed that Q2 was the strongest second quarter on record.

Karl Tomusk, associate, UK living research, at JLL, said: “The headline numbers are, of course, encouraging and point to a market seeing considerable investor demand, including from institutions.

“But the challenge continues to be finding ways to make development stack up. Even compared with the last few years, which no one would have described as a walk in the park for development, the dearth of investment in new multi-family homes so far in 2026 is staggering.

“With the conflict in the Middle East still ongoing, the economic backdrop continues to be less certain than we expected it to be at the start of the year. If conditions do improve, we should see a recovery in what is fundamentally an undersupplied sector.”

However, the firm also warned forward-purchasing and land acquisitions fell to their lowest level since 2015, making up 10% of all multi-family investment H1.