On my researches on the internet I keep reading about how landlords are selling up to avoid licensing. But is this really the case? When speaking this afternoon to Dave Princeps, Operations Manager at Camden Environmental Heath Section and Chair of the London Landlord Accreditation Scheme, I asked him what he thought about it. “Its…
It looks as if the additional administration associated with HMOs is putting landlords off landlording. A survey by RICS, reported here finds that landlords are either selling up or are just letting to three or less people, in order to avoid licensing. Which would mean that although licensing is cutting down on rogue landlords, this…
The new HMO licensing regulations are now effective and the three month ‘grace period’ has now ended. Landlords who have failed to obtain a license face fines of up to £20,000, plus risk tenants applying for rent repayment orders while being unable to evict them via the section 21 procedure. But have the government played…
When a South Tynside landlord tried to evict his tenants rather than get an HMO license he was asking for trouble. And he got it. When one of his tenants applied for re-housing the Council realised his landlord was acting in breach of the law. The Homelessness Team alerted the Environmental Health Service who tried…
All those English landlords moaning about licensing should be grateful that they are not in Scotland. All Scottish landlords now need to register both as a landlord and per property (£55 and £11 per property for a three year period). A report in Residential Landlord states that some 57,000 have registered over 105,000 properties netting…
As I have mentioned before in this blog, there are new management regulations now in force for landlords of HMO properties. These provide for the landlord (or his manager) to provide contact details to occupiers, ensure that the property is safe in various respects (fire safety, handrails and banisters, bars on windows with low cills…
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Councils in crisis with HMO backlogs
An interesting article in Inside Housing gives the not entirely unexpected news that Local Authorities are finding it difficult to cope with all the licensing applications they have received. Indeed it appears that some of them have not issued any licenses at all yet. A survey of 10 Councils by Inside Housing showed that 6,380…