"There a dark side to the UK’s rental market with unscrupulous landlords..."
According to Multi-Let UK, 70% of HMO investors want the Government and Local Councils to do more to crack down on HMO landlords who are abusing the law and 52% of investors want to see local councils make more inspection visits to identify HMOs that are not up to standard.
A further 48% of investors are calling for more severe penalty for slum HMO landlords.
The research also reveals that one in five investors would like to see councils with more power to ensure HMO landlords are compliant with all the legislation and regulations.
Over half of investors are happy with the current legislation, but do not think more legislation will stamp out poor quality HMOs.
The majority of investors (73%) believe that slum landlords are giving HMOs a poor reputation, but over 50% admit that ensuring their properties are compliant with the current regulations are a key cause of stress for them.
Findings from the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB), show that private landlords are taking £5.6bn in rent on homes that ‘don’t meet legal standards’ – £1.3bn of which comes from state housing benefits. The body has said it believes that 740,000 families in the English private rent sector are living in homes that present a severe threat to the occupants’ health.
Housing charity Shelter, has put the number of people living in accommodation that is unfit for human habitation, or where the landlord exploits or harasses them, at more than 250,000.
Figures from the Residential Landlords Association also show that 2,006 landlords were convicted between 2007-2015, with the average fine handed down standing at £1,500. According to research from The Times, more than a quarter of English councils had not prosecuted any landlords at all for providing unsafe accommodation in the last five years, while another half were reportedly prosecuting fewer than two a year.
Daniel Hill, MD of Multi-Let UK comments: “As we all know, there a dark side to the UK’s rental market with unscrupulous landlords, renting HMOs to numerous tenants, which are neither safe or secure and openly flouting the law. There is increasing pressure on all landlords with Right to Rent, the new tax rules, ongoing legislation to name but a few. HMOs are particularly challenging, with complex legal compliance requirements, mandatory and additional licensing, building regulations and an increased governance over the HMO sector.
Despite this, in many areas around the UK there are HMO landlords providing poor quality accommodation which fails to meet the statutory requirements, putting tenants’ wellbeing and potentially lives at risk.
More and more councils are re-examining inspection procedures and legislative guidelines surrounding the need for landlords to gain an HMO licence. However, our research shows that there are a large number of HMO landlords who believe that not enough is being done to stamp out slum landlords.
The good news is that the majority of HMO landlords are taking a proactive approach, ensuring there properties meet all the latest legal requirements and regulations. There is also a lot of support available from specialist management firms that will relieve the burden of managing multiple occupancy properties. We have just rolled a national, bespoke management service, Multi-Let UK to help landlords and investors running HMO, or multi-let portfolios.”
