London mayor Sadiq Khan is being urged to pull advertisements encouraging landlords to move into tourist lets.

Following a significant drop in the number of homes available to rent long-term in the capital, the Residential Landlords Association (RLA) has added its support to calls for Khan to remove the adverts by short-term letting firms Hostmaker from the Transport for London (TfL) network.

Research shows that the number of available properties to rent is plummeting at an alarming rate across some parts of London, and this is placing upward pressure on rents.

According to RLA, listings on the short-term lettings site, Airbnb, increased by 60% to 53,000 listings in the capital in the 12 months to 2017 alone and the popularity of these sites shows no sign of abating.

Laws limit the number of days homes in London can be let on a short-term basis to 90 nights a year to prevent homes being taken from the long term rental market, with Airbnb making a firm commitment to enforcing these rules.

But a recent BBC investigation found Hostmaker was one of a number of companies encouraging people to flout these rules.

David Smith, policy director for the RLA, said: “While people have the right to do what they want with their properties, the movement of homes from the long term to short-term lettings sector is damaging to communities and to the supply of homes to rent for ordinary Londoners. The sentiment of these advertisements contradicts the Mayor’s own policy on short-term lettings, and we call for their swift removal.”