Student landlords protest over £315,000 HMO stealth tax

Student landlords have coughed up an extra £315,000 fees in just a year to comply with a council’s new house in multiple occupation licensing scheme. Cardiff City Council has collected the cash from 824 licence applications in the city’s Cathays neighbourhood, a favourite place to live with students at the city’s universities. The council is targetting 1,500 HMOs in the neighbourhood, with 500 licences granted. The money is charged for an additional licensing scheme. Landlords claim the £500 licence fees are just a stealth tax, while the council argues that imposing the licensing scheme maintains higher housing standards. Douglas Haig, of Cardiff Landlords Forum, said: “Our argument is additional licensing is a fee generating exercise. “The resources generated by additional licensing have clearly not been spent particularly wisely. It would appear the council will expand the scheme in to another district simply to increase revenue to keep the scheme going.” Landlords want the fees to go towards benchmarking minimum HMO standards rather than funding other council spending. The additional licensing fees are paid by owners of small HMOs with three to five tenants. A council spokesman said: “Landlords with four or five students in a property make more than £60,000 over five years, so to ask for £500 to make sure the property is up to standard is not a lot. “We’re checking fire safety and ensuring that gas and electricity certificates are up to date.” Meanwhile, Bath and North East Somerset Council has earmarked £45,000 for spending on a report to assess if special planning permission is needed for student shared houses and other HMOs. If the report recommends tightening up HMO controls, the council will start consultation for an Article 4 Direction under the Town and Country Planning Act. The direction requires landlords to apply for planning permission to convert a family home in to an HMO. In another HMO licensing row, the courts have ruled a Dundee City Council restriction limiting landlord Lee Chadwick’s HMO licence to six-months was unfair. Councillors took the decision after complaints from neighbours about noise and litter from the rental property, but the court found the condition was unfair because Mr Chadwick was singled out to pay a £1,000 fee to the council every time the licence is reviewed.

Landlord blog

Siobhan Smith

Further reading

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