Using room within rented house for business

tbs624

Lilith1980 wrote: »

Once we have been given the go ahead that we have been accepted for the property I will find out more about the content of the rental agreement.

You should be checking out the content of that tenancy agreement *before* you start coughing up application fees etc, even if you weren't considering asking about business use possibility.

CIS

Your council tax could also increase as you're having clients to the house. Car parking will also cause concerns for the council.

Council Tax wouldn't increase - at worst the council tax charge would go down and part of the property become rateable for business rates.

Lilith1980

Wow, sounds more complicated than I thought. I had thought of renting a separate room. I think it would concern me if I had a lack of clients and the room stood empty, thereby I would be paying rent on the room whilst not making an income.

However, from all the things people are highlighting it sounds like renting a separate room would be 'easier'. Thanks for bringing all these things to my attention, I wouldn't have thought of them otherwise

Errata

Do you have anything remotely resembling a Business Plan? Everything posters have pointed out to to you would have come to light during the creation of one.

PasturesNew

Lilith1980 wrote: »

Wow, sounds more complicated than I thought. I had thought of renting a separate room. I think it would concern me if I had a lack of clients and the room stood empty, thereby I would be paying rent on the room whilst not making an income.

Rooms to rent for such a purpose might be £40-50/week, I am often surprised at how cheap they are when I see consulting type rooms advertised..

If you compare the cost of a 2-bed house to the 3-bed you're after, you might find paying for an extra bedroom's going to cost you more than getting a proper business room.

Lilith1980

Errata wrote: »

Do you have anything remotely resembling a Business Plan? Everything posters have pointed out to to you would have come to light during the creation of one.

To be honest no I had not sat down and thought in any great depth at this point, purely because I just wanted to see what the view was in terms of using a room in a rented house. If the property was owned by me then I would be looking deeper into it, but initially I just wanted to know from a landlord's perspective about using part of their property for business use.

poppysarah

Lagoon wrote: »

I run a business from a rented home, but I'm not allowed to run a COMPANY from a rented home. I can't register as a Limited Company with Companies House, as this would require me to provide my address as the 'business address'.
.

Why not have a ltd company which uses an accountant's address as the 'business address'

It's more to do with 'trading physically' at an address. Deliveries, customers, clients visiting all day etc.

If it is limited in numbers (as counselling would be) and hopefully there would be parking room at the property then it's unlikely anyone would ever know there was a business - and as such it could not be causing offence.

Any business that makes a noise, attracts regular footfall, large numbers of deliveries etc is likely to be a nuisance to neighbours and not be allowed.

Consider home insurance too though. You'll need liability insurance for people at your home.

poppysarah

room512 wrote: »

Your council tax could also increase as you're having clients to the house. Car parking will also cause concerns for the council.

Don't use a whole room for your business.

If you counsel then have a guitar or artist materials in there too - so it's a room in your house you play guitar in and also have for your counselling.

theartfullodger

I'm sure any lettings agent and/or landlord would expect to be told of mental health patients being treated on the premises... (or any other landlord or any other premises, including commercial...)

Might make for interesting insurance claims... should things go wrong....

Shouldn;'t be a problem as long as everything is declared & made clear to all concerned/..... and good on you for trying to grow a business..

I doubt many residential LLs would agree however..

Lilith1980

Yes, I must admit the fact that I'd be working with people who are potentially experiencing high levels of mental distress did make me wonder whether a LL would accept such a business being run.

If I set up in private practice I'd have to have professional liability insurance anyway just in case things went wrong, although that might be of small comfort to a LL.