HOUSING in multiple occupation – the scourge of the community or economic generator?

People often feel unsettled about houses in multiple occupation (HMOs) taking over a neighbourhood and so the Government is under pressure from communities and councils to address issues that arise.

As a result of this pressure, the Government is looking to control and manage HMOs through the planning process. The Department for Communities and Local Government has released a draft report.

Under the current planning regime there is no differentiation between housing occupied by a family and a group of people renting a house together room by room.

The only controls are difficult to interpret and are mainly accepted as having an effect when more than six people occupy a single home and do not live together as one household.

This is set out in the Town and Country Planning (Use Classes) Order 1987 (T&CP UCO), with a dwelling falling within use class C3, and the exclusion of an HMO from the Order giving it a “sui generis” status, or use not within any defined use classes.

The other way councils have been seeking control is through policies applied to development that requires planning permission.

These policies seek to control the concentration of development, particularly for student homes, and also how extensions are granted to property that could become suitable for multiple occupation. This is a blunt tool that can cause restrictions on genuine family homes.

So, to enable authorities to manage the concentration of HMOs, changes to the planning regime are proposed:

Subdivision of the C3 (house) use class to include a new classification, C4, specifically for HMOs (to be defined as dwellings used by three or more people who form two or more households).

The report suggests councils put in their development plan policies to control location and scale of HMOs.

The use of Article 4 directions to remove powers for properties to be converted to HMOs without express planning permission.

If HMOs are redefined, it will become more difficult to create them as permitted development.

Katherine Brooker is a senior planner in the property department at Dickinson Dees LLP