Square foot size of room for bedroom tax

Big_is_beautiful

This information may well have been listed before, but today a Police Office informed me of a section of the Housing Act 1985 sec 326 states that rooms under a certain size are not classed as bedrooms.
Here is the link.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1985/68/section/326

A room measuring between 50sq ft and 70sq ft can only accommodate 1/2 a person, (child under 10). This may indeed mean that a room this small cannot be classed as an extra bedroom.

I am sure someone will check this out and correct me if I am wrong.

PasturesNew

I find that unbelievable as most houses have bedrooms in that range. e.g. the smallest there, 50 sq ft, could be 7' square - certainly larger than the bedroom I had at my parents' home. As for 70 sq ft, that's just under 9' square - certainly larger than a lot of 1-bed homes' largest bedroom! In fact, given half an hour and Rightmove I bet a group of keen MSE'ers could find whole 3-bed houses where all three bedrooms were under 70 sq ft. And probably 99% of park homes have all bedrooms under that size.

cockaleekee

That definition is specific to the overcrowding criteria. It has no relevance to the under occupancy charge.

dseventy

Surely its down to what the property is listed when you take occupation?

Was it listed as a 1/2/3/4 bed property?

D70

cockaleekee

dseventy wrote: »

Surely its down to what the property is listed when you take occupation?

Was it listed as a 1/2/3/4 bed property?

D70

The local authorities are allowed to make their own definition (within reason). Some are sticking to what is on the tenancy, but others are making fresh determinations, including counting additional "living" rooms (e.g. dining rooms) as bedrooms.

Big_is_beautiful

I still think it is worth querying with the councils. My house is ex local authority and I have a box room of around 48sq ft. It was classed as a 3 bedroomed house, however when the person next door tried to sell theirs the Estate Agent listed it as a 2 bed property and they had to drop the price.
This now makes some sense if a small room is only suitable for 1/2 a person, it is questionable whether a LA can charge 14% extra when it is legally not classed as a room. I am sure someone will make a suitable case of this. Good luck to them.

cockaleekee

Big_is_beautiful wrote: »

I still think it is worth querying with the councils. My house is ex local authority and I have a box room of around 48sq ft. It was classed as a 3 bedroomed house, however when the person next door tried to sell theirs the Estate Agent listed it as a 2 bed property and they had to drop the price.
This now makes some sense if a small room is only suitable for 1/2 a person, it is questionable whether a LA can charge 14% extra when it is legally not classed as a room. I am sure someone will make a suitable case of this. Good luck to them.

It is not classed as a room solely for overcrowding purposes. Different definitions are used for different purposes, for instance someone may be disabled under the Equality Act but not entitled to DLA. That does not make one definition wrong, simply different. There is no case to be made here.

dseventy

cockaleekee wrote: »

The local authorities are allowed to make their own definition (within reason). Some are sticking to what is on the tenancy, but others are making fresh determinations, including counting additional "living" rooms (e.g. dining rooms) as bedrooms.

That sounds reasonable, I would hope this would happen.

D70

asdf1982

Big_is_beautiful wrote: »

I still think it is worth querying with the councils. My house is ex local authority and I have a box room of around 48sq ft. It was classed as a 3 bedroomed house, however when the person next door tried to sell theirs the Estate Agent listed it as a 2 bed property and they had to drop the price.
This now makes some sense if a small room is only suitable for 1/2 a person, it is questionable whether a LA can charge 14% extra when it is legally not classed as a room. I am sure someone will make a suitable case of this. Good luck to them.

the box room thing is to do with it not having a window, not a reference to size. is it possible a window was added to your but not theirs

Honest_broker07

many new build have all bedrooms less than 70 Sq Foot.

My sons 3 bed house has 2 less than 70 SQ foot I mean thats 7 * 10.

And I can think of many terraced house where they are all below that figure

at 50 Sq foot you could easily get a Double bed in !

http://www.diynot.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=82362
seems to have this it looks like building regs, but out house is 12 years old and the smallest bedroom is smaller than this.

fluffymovie

Big_is_beautiful wrote: »

I still think it is worth querying with the councils. My house is ex local authority and I have a box room of around 48sq ft. It was classed as a 3 bedroomed house, however when the person next door tried to sell theirs the Estate Agent listed it as a 2 bed property and they had to drop the price.
This now makes some sense if a small room is only suitable for 1/2 a person, it is questionable whether a LA can charge 14% extra when it is legally not classed as a room. I am sure someone will make a suitable case of this. Good luck to them.

It isn't the council charging more! It's the government reducing the amount of benefit we can legally pay.

There's another very similar post on this where I have added a link to the guidance on this.