London,
19
June
2015
|
11:15
Europe/London

Landlord licensing to raise private housing standards

We’re introducing new licensing conditions for landlords of shared accommodation from 8 December 2015.

This follows our licensing consultation where we received responses from 1,400 people and 70% of these agreed with our plans. Camden residents, businesses, tenants and landlords took part. We also had input from people in neighbouring areas to our borough.

The scheme will benefit more than 20,000 tenants by improving standards of privately-rented, shared housing – properties known as HMOs (Houses in Multiple Occupation). These are properties such as house shares, bedsits and converted flats.

This will provide people with more rights and improved living standards. It will also enable landlords to run better businesses.

Landlords of an estimated 8,000 homes will be required to apply for the five-year licence. Terms include their properties meeting a set of standards, plus a licence fee.

Why we’re licensing

A third of Camden households live in privately rented homes, and we estimate over 30% of these live in shared housing.

We found two in five of these homes we surveyed had a serious or other health and safety issue, such as fire hazards, risk of falls, poor home security and excess cold – which is known to cause mould and damp.

Licensing will tackle poor conditions like these, provide decent housing and strengthen tenants’ rights when challenging poor landlords.

The scheme will come into effect on 8 December this year.

Find out more on our licensing pages: camden.gov.uk/hmolicensing/additional or call the team on 020 7974 2543.