HMO rule change investigation

SHARED HOUSES MAY NEED TO SEEK PLANNING PERMISSION

- By JOSEPH CONNOLLY Local democracy reporter

RUSHCLIFFE Borough Council will formally investigate whether it should bring in a rule to make it so that landlords would have to get permission to turn a house in the borough into an HMO.

Currently, permitted development laws in the UK mean that properties can be turned into HMOs - where single rooms are let out to unrelated people as in a houseshare = without council knowledge, as long as they don’t house more than six people.

But Article 4 of the 2015 Town & Country Planning Order says that councils can seek a direction to revoke the permitted development laws, if there is enough evidence to suggest that a crackdown on HMOs needs to be made in an area.

HMOs are popular with landlords because renting them out to individuals is more lucrative as they can charge per room rather than for the whole house.