Licensing Consultation in Southwark

Mandy nice to hear from you again and pleasing to see Croydon have a JR in the offing i understand Con is giving them a steer on what to do - hope you are keeping well. If you get the update on the 4th can you post it up? Regards Chris

Reply to the comment left by "chris wright" at "30/07/2015 - 13:44":

Hi Chris - good to hear from you again.

I'll be posting info about the hearing on the Croydon SL thread and an email with more specific details is going out to those on the CPF mailing list this afternoon.

Regards,
Mandy

So, the licensing comes in with effect from 1st November 2015 with minimum room sizes cited as 10 m2 (reduced to 8 m2 if there is a shared lounge. This could be interesting....

Reply to the comment left by "Y L Newbury " at "06/08/2015 - 12:19":

It seems this is a relaxation of the previous 'standards', right ?

I also noted they took on board the discussion on this site with regards to fire regs. They now seem to (very sensibly in my view) indicate it is a good idea for the landlords to have a professional fire risk report done and then comply to that report, whereas previously they were going into lots of details about fire doors, fire extinguishers, etc.

I'm not sure where you spotted that Cristian? There is still quite a bit of info. on fire doors etc contained in the Southwark Private Rental Standard document and the LACORS fire safety guidance, both of which the landlord must comply with in order to obtain the licence, plus the minimum room sizes which are larger than the standard ex-local authority room sizes. In other words my neighbours who are council tenants with Southwark Council have the same size rooms as our privately rented flat, yet they will be able to continue to rent those (local authorities are exempt from these requirements) yet we may be stopped from letting out the same size rooms by the same local authority? I am hoping that is as batty as it sounds and will not be the case, but that is not what John Daley confirmed earlier in our conversations, as he claimed the smaller 3rd bedroom was built for a child. Strangely enough it is these low cost smaller bedrooms (over 7.5sqm) that are the most popular rooms in our flats! Hopefully the Council will have the same attitude to us as we do to our tenants and will " do the right thing" by us and our tenants and allow us to continue to rent those rooms as bedrooms We will have to see.....

Reply to the comment left by "Y L Newbury " at "06/08/2015 - 14:21":

It seems like there are a few moving parts right now...

On one hand I agree that Southwark is pushing through its Additional Licensing. However, as you identified it will be applicable only from November. As I still do not have fire doors and mains-fire alarms fitted I am rather inclined to have a visit from the council, have them noted what is missing and then rectify the shortfalls. I am afraid that doing it first myself may mean that I will end up spending lots of money just so that I have to rectify the issues later on.

Second, and important point is today's consultation from the government (https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/450862/Discussion_paper_FINAL.pdf), which states "We will publish a separate discussion document in due course about the proposed extension of mandatory licensing for Houses in Multiple Occupation."

There is no further mention as to what is going to be proposed, but one could imagine that there will be some nation-wide Additional Licensing scheme, with reasonable fees and objective assessment of bedroom sizes (or maybe no sizes at all, aside from those required by law - 6.5sqm). At the same time they could potentially remove the Article 4 powers from the councils, as they have proved to be effected on ambiguous terms.

Therefore, all eyes now on the consultation from the government which may make Southwark's licensing a redundant policy.

Finally, in terms of small rooms... Whilst this is not a long-term solution I seemed to read that in Newham the council acted "in the best interest of tenants" and did not instruct any evictions even if the room sizes did not fit in the requirements. They however instructed the landlord not to find a replacement tenant for the specific room in question, once this person departs. So if you do find long term tenants and incentivise them with appropriate rent, you may have the problem resolved for 3-5 years (and then the government may bring in more changes anyway).

Thanks LondonProperty1 for your response which I enjoyed reading and does give me some hope. I think this was the very reason I was surprised to see Southwark launching the scheme now, when the Govt have already stated they will be bringing in licensing possibly for presently non-mandatory HMOs.

I also agree with your approach and will wait for an inspection to identify specific regulations particularly with regard to fire regs.

I will just have to wait for more details to emerge from Southwark Council and the Govt.

Reply to the comment left by "Y L Newbury " at "06/08/2015 - 15:48":

If someone does apply for an additional/selective license at Southwark, it would be probably very much appreciated by others to hear how the process went and how flexible the council was.

On another note, wasn't the original proposed fee £60 per bedroom? How come did it increase to £250?! It was not supposed to be about cost!

Reply to the comment left by "Y L Newbury " at "06/08/2015 - 14:21":

HMO Standards can be found here:
http://www.southwark.gov.uk/info/200077/private_rented_housing/973/property_licensing/3

Page 2 of this document, formally adopted in July 2015, states that HMO Standard takes precedent over the PRS Standards.

Page 8 of the HMO Standards states:
If you don’t have the expertise ortime to do the fire risk assessment yourself you’ll need to appoint a ‘competent person’ to help, eg a professional risk assessor