Question about HMO licence

tallac

I'm looking at helping a family member with doing some landlord management and I'm looking at the rules for HMO licence.

The property that will be rented is currently a 3 bedroom house but could be made into a 4 bedroom house. The council borough for it is Barnet, London.

Reading the page here (https://www.barnet.gov.uk/housing/private-housing/houses-multiple-occupation#title-0) it sounds like it would fall under an Additional HMO Licence.

The main applying rule is "it has 2 or more storeys, occupied by four or more persons in 2 or more households and where some or all facilities are shared or lacking"

From my understanding then, an HMO wouldn't be required in any of these scenarios:

• one household (a family) of 3 or even 4 people wish to rent
• a couple and an unrelated single adult wish to rent
• 3 separate unrelated adults wish to rent

The reason why there's doubt is that a local estate agent said that a HMO would be required if 3 separate unrelated adults wanted to rent. But this contradicts the Barnet page so I'm thinking they probably made a mistake.

Is any able to confirm my understanding?

AdrianC

Would these three separate unrelated adults be three households, one per bedroom? Because if so...

theartfullodger

Good for you.  What training in the legal minefield of HMO have you done?  

Get things wrong and tenants may be un-evictable, and all rent payments returned to them under court order.

tallac

theartfullodger said:

Good for you.  What training in the legal minefield of HMO have you done?  

Get things wrong and tenants may be un-evictable, and all rent payments returned to them under court order.

So better to stick with single family tenant?

justworriedabit

OP
I think they are talking change in rules in 2018 and additional, mandatory licencing in certain circumstances. Just reading your OP, to me it's a HMO and I'm no expert.

We have, are considering buying a HMO, but possibly one to turn to a HMO as it is often cheaper, we shall see. It is a mine field and on paper the gross rets look 101% but the extra costs, the problems, etc, etc mean the headline figures are not always what they seem

Every coucil in London I think has gone on the gravy train of getting more money out of landlords by making almost every LL get a licence etc if they fall into an area of concern and nicer properties will get caught out in their enchantments.

Re HMO, it does need to be heavily regualted as there are often big problems with not so good LL's and equally as poor T's.

btw, I've not noted any "contradictions" but I'm no expert.

MaryNB

I think you might not be understanding the difference between a HMO and a licensed HMO. 
While some small HMOs don't require a license, they are still classed as a HMO and it does have implications - for example, lenders may view it differently to renting to a single household and it will affect the type of mortgage you require. 

Both the council and government says a HMO relates to people forming more than one household. 

The government classes a HMO as 3 or more people forming 1 or more household and a large HMO requiring a licence to be 5 or more people forming more than 1 household. House in multiple occupation licence

Local councils are allowed to bring in additional licensing above and beyond government rules, which Barnett does in their "Additional HMO Licence" section. 

tallac

I'm just trying to maximise rental income. Didn't realise there would be so much extra problems doing a HMO for 3 people.

tallac

theartfullodger said:

Good for you.  What training in the legal minefield of HMO have you done?  

Get things wrong and tenants may be un-evictable, and all rent payments returned to them under court order.

How do existing landlords deal with this where they have just a single property but have 3 or 4 unrelated people who rent out the property? Surely it can't be that difficult given there are many landlords in this situation. No?

dimbo61

I am a HMO landlord.
EPC, EICR GSC, PAT testing, and legionnaires checks.
Fit for Habitation, joint and several tenancies, deposits, right to rent, how to rent, addendum, parent guarantors, prescribed information.
Mains wired interlinked smoke alarms, CO alarms, fire blankets, 30 minute  fire doors, fire escape windows, Turn locks on exit doors and emergency lighting.
Security, CCTV, bedroom size 10.5m2 !
Number of bathrooms, size of kitchen and living rooms. 
Layout of buildings and number of floors.
Management of tenants/property.
Simple really and getting a HMO licence of course.
Finance to buy 

AdrianC

tallac said:

How do existing landlords deal with this where they have just a single property but have 3 or 4 unrelated people who rent out the property?

Living as a single household, or as 3 or 4 separate ones?

A house-share is a single tenancy, one household.

An HMO is multiple tenancies, multiple households.

edgex

tallac said:

I'm just trying to maximise rental income. Didn't realise there would be so much extra problems doing a HMO for 3 people.

Surely your trying to maximise profit?