London Borough of Sutton

You do not need a licence if you rent your property to a single family as Sutton Council do not operate a selective licensing scheme.

If you rent your property as a House in Multiple Occupation (HMO), the answer is a bit more complicated. Whilst Sutton Council do not operate an additional licensing scheme, some HMOs do need a licence under the mandatory HMO licensing scheme that applies throughout England.

You will need a mandatory HMO licence if your property meets the standard test, self-contained flat test or converted building test HMO definition in section 254 of the Housing Act 2004 and is occupied by five or more people.

But what are these tests and what does this mean in practice? It means you need a licence for any house or flat that is occupied by five or more people who are not all related and live in the property as their main home. For example, it includes:

• Shared houses and flats occupied by students and young professionals;
• Properties converted into bedsits with some shared facilities; and
• Properties converted into a mixture of self-contained and non self-contained accommodation.  

Prior to 1 October 2018, the mandatory HMO licensing scheme only applied to properties that were three or more storeys in height, but that restriction has now been lifted.

The government have decided to exclude purpose built self-contained flats within a block comprising three or more self-contained flats from the mandatory HMO licensing scheme. While this will be good news for some landlords, it does make the licensing scheme far more complicated.

To find out more, you can read our free guide to mandatory HMO licensing (here).

Sutton Council HMO licence fees vary according to the number of lettings.

The standard fee is £250 (was £240 in 2020/21, £185 in 2017/18 & £180 in 2015/2016) per letting, so that would be £1,250 for shared house with five single person lettings. There are no discounts listed for accredited landlords, which we think is a shame.

The fees we’ve listed are correct as of November 2021. When we checked in December 2022 the fees had disappeared from the council's website so they might have changed. 

It is very confusing! When we last checked in December 2022, the HMO licence application form had disappeared from the council’s website. Instead, the council were directing applicants to the gov.uk website, which tells applicants they can’t apply online and need to contact the council!

If you need assistance with your licence application, you can find companies offering a licence application handling service in our Landlord Suppliers Directory (here). Whilst we do handle some applications, we have limited capacity and specialise in more complex cases where we provide our clients with expert advice and assistance.

It is important to remember that submitting a licence application is only the start of the licence approval process. To help landlords understand what happens next, we have published a free guide here.

Yes, Sutton Council have adopted HMO standards although last time we checked we could not find them on the council’s website. We have tracked down their HMO standards from 2012 which you can download from the ‘More information’ box on the right on this page. We don’t know if there is a more recent unpublished version.

The standards cover a range of issues such as kitchen, bathroom and toilet facilities, fire precautions, heating, lighting, ventilation and room sizes.

It is important to note that new absolute minimum bedroom sizes for licensed HMOs have been introduced for HMO licence applications approved on or after 1 October 2018:

• 4.64m2 for a child under 10 years old
• 6.51m2 for one person over 10 years old
• 10.22m2 for two people over 10 years old

The council can still ask for larger minimum sizes. These new minimum sizes apply throughout England to HMOs licensed under a mandatory HMO or additional licensing scheme.

In March 2015, Sutton Council told us they had licensed 28 HMOs. When we checked in February 2017 and there were 30 listed in the public register.

In May 2019, the council told us they had licensed 47 HMOs.

Sutton Council keeps a public register of licensed HMOs although it has disappeared from the council’s website so you will need to contact them if you want to view the register.

In May 2019, the council told us they think there are about 100 licensable HMOs. This means there could be about 50 properties that need licensing, but where no application has yet been submitted.

Ignore the law and you could pay a heavy price. You risk being prosecuted by the council and if found guilty you could get a criminal record, be fined an unlimited amount and ordered to pay court costs and a victim surcharge.

Alternatively, the council can issue you with a civil penalty notice of up to £30,000 for not having the correct licence without any warning being given, so this is really serious stuff.  

You could also be subject to a Rent Repayment Order and may have to repay up to 12 months rental income.

Whilst the property is unlicensed, you can’t use a Notice of Seeking Possession under Section 21 Housing Act 1988 to evict your tenants. 
  
And following a successful prosecution, you would probably fail a fit and proper person assessment, making it very difficult for you to obtain a property licence in the future.

Don’t put your livelihood and reputation at risk. Make sure you comply with the law.

Sutton Council told us they took two housing prosecution over the five year period from 1 April 2011 to 31 March 2016 plus a further two prosecutions in 2016/17, so it seems they are starting to step up their housing enforcement activity.

Sutton Council did not obtain any Rent Repayment Orders from the landlords of unlicensed HMOs over the six years from April 2011 to March 2017. This is based on data published by the Courts and Tribunals Judiciary. 

For all the latest information, you can search for housing prosecutions on the Mayor of London’s ‘Rogue landlord and agent checker’, available here. 

There are landlord accreditation schemes operated by the London Landlord Accreditation Scheme, the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) and other organisations.  

Whilst we don’t have any figures for the NRLA scheme, we have got information about the London Landlord Accreditation Scheme that is supported by all the London Boroughs. In January 2016, they told us there were 296 accredited landlords in Sutton, which is the 5th lowest out of all London boroughs.

January 2018: 309 accredited landlords
January 2019: 516 accredited landlords
January 2020: 539 accredited landlords
January 2021: 569 accredited landlords

By January 2022 there were 799 accredited landlords, which is below average when compared to all the London boroughs. To find out more about becoming accredited, you can visit the London Landlord Accreditation Scheme website here. 

In addition to training and development, accredited landlords are entitled to various benefits, including discounted licensing fees in some boroughs. If you are not already a member, we would encourage you to think about joining!

No, it seems not. There are keeping things simple! In December 2015, Sutton Council told us they were not considering the introduction of a selective or additional licensing scheme and we’ve heard nothing further since then.

We will continue to monitor the situation and will let you know if anything changes.

You will need planning permission if you are changing your property from a single-family property to a house in multiple occupation (HMO) occupied by more than six people. HMOs occupied by more than six people fall within ‘sui-generis’ use for which planning permission is required. You also need planning permission if you a splitting up a property into smaller self-contained units of accommodation. 

For smaller HMOs, the rules are a bit more complicated. HMOs occupied by between three and six people fall into planning use class C4 whereas single-family properties fall into planning use class C3.

In November 2021, we checked on the council’s website and there was no mention of an HMO Article 4 Direction although this could be subject to change in the future. More information can be found on the council’s website. 

This means that you do not need planning permission for a change of use from a single-family property (use class C3) to a small HMO shared by three to six unrelated residents (use class C4).

Remember that this is only intended as general advice and no liability can be accepted for any reliance upon information provided. We would strongly encourage you to contact the Council’s Planning Department or seek independent legal advice before you start a new HMO development. 

We certainly can. We understand the challenges of being a private landlord and so we have developed a Landlord Suppliers Directory to provide you with access to the goods and services you need. The Directory concentrates on businesses that operate in the London area.

Whether you a looking for a letting agent, want a property inventory for a new tenancy or fire risk assessment, we have got it covered – and far more besides!

As the leading experts in property licensing, we also offer a range of services ourselves. From handling the licence application process to advice on new HMO developments, we can help to ensure your property business remains compliant. If you need assistance, please drop us a line and see if we can help!

New suppliers are regularly being added and we would encourage you to take a look. Some of our featured listings also contain YouTube videos, helping you to find out more about the business.
 

You can contact the council at: 

Environmental Health Team
Sutton Council
Civic Offices
St Nicholas Way
Sutton
Surrey SM1 1EA

Email: Environmentalhealth@sutton.gov.uk
Tel:       020 8770 5000
Website: www.sutton.gov.uk