London Borough of Sutton
If you need help understanding the property licensing rules in Sutton you have come to the right place! We are experts in housing regulation and have produced this free guide to help you understand the council’s property licensing schemes.
If you need a licence for your rented property our support doesn’t end there. Our Landlord Suppliers Directory (view here) lists companies that offer a licence application handling service. You can also find companies offering other goods and services to help you manage your property portfolio and achieve compliance.
Licensing Requirements
There are two property licensing scheme operating in Sutton. We will help you choose the right licence for your property:
1. Mandatory HMO licence
In Sutton you 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.
The government have excluded 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 more complicated.
Read our free guide to mandatory HMO licensing to find out more (here).
2. Additional licence
In Sutton you need an additional licence if your property is let as a House in Multiple Occupation that falls outside the remit of mandatory HMO licensing. It includes properties shared by three or four people who are not all related and share facilities.
The additional licensing scheme started on 22 March 2026, continues for five years and applies borough wide. You can view the scheme designation in the ‘At a Glance’ box on the top right of this page.Â
Sutton Council seem to have included ‘section 257 HMOs: certain converted blocks of flats’ in the scheme. These are properties that:
- have been converted into self-contained flats; and
- less than two thirds of the flats are owner occupied; and
- the conversion did not comply with the relevant Building Regulations in force at that time and still does not comply.
Read our free guide to additional licensing to find out more (here).
In Sutton the HMO licence application fee is £285 per letting, so that is £1,425 for a five bedroom shared house occupied by five people. There is no fee discount listed for accredited landlords.
The fees we have listed were correct in March 2026 but could be subject to change in the future. The fees can be viewed on the council’s website.
Sutton Council have no online HMO licence application system. Instead, you must download an HMO licence application form from the council’s website, complete it and return it to the council.Â
If you need assistance with your licence application, you can find companies offering a licence application handling service in our Landlord Suppliers Directory (here).
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.
Sutton Council have published local HMO guidance that you can view on the council’s website.
The guidance covers a range of issues such as kitchen, bathroom and toilet facilities, fire precautions, heating, lighting, ventilation and room sizes.
The government have introduced absolute minimum bedroom sizes that apply to all licensed HMOs:
- 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 ask for larger minimum sizes. These minimum sizes apply throughout England to HMOs licensed under a mandatory HMO or additional licensing scheme.
In February 2025 there were 177 properties listed in Sutton Council’s public register of licensed HMOs.
Sutton Council has a public register of licensed HMOs which can be viewed on the council’s website.
In November 2025 Sutton Council estimated there were 900 HMOs in the borough, with 210 that require licensing under the mandatory HMO licensing scheme and 690 that require licensing under the additional licensing scheme.
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.
In London, most boroughs publish information about housing prosecutions and civil financial penalties on the Mayor of London’s ‘Rogue landlord and agent checker’. You can search the database by entering a property address, landlord / agent name or by selecting the relevant borough, 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
January 2022: 799 accredited landlords
January 2023: 1,264 accredited landlords
January 2024: 1,291 accredited landlords
January 2025: 1,326 accredited landlords
By January 2026 there were 1,364 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.Â
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!
On 17 June 2025 Sutton Council launched a public consultation on plans to implement an additional landlord licensing scheme. Little was known about the proposed additional licensing scheme as the only information published on the council’s website was the consultation questionnaire. The consultation ended on 8 September 2025. You can find more information on the council’s website.Â
We thought the council should relaunch the consultation once the business case had been published, but they didn’t. The council’s Housing, Economy and Business Committee approved a borough wide additional licensing scheme on 25 November 2025 (read here – agenda item 32) and it came into force on 22 March 2026.
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You 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 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.
On 22 February 2024 Sutton Council made a non-immediate HMO Article 4 Direction that removes the permitted development rights to change a property from a single-family house (use class C3) to an HMO occupied by up to six people (use class C4) without planning permission.
We understand Sutton Council held a public consultation although we were not aware of it. The borough wide HMO Article 4 Direction came into force on 22 February 2025. From that date, letting your property to three or more people who are not all related requires planning permission.
You can view the HMO Article 4 Direction in the ‘At a Glance’ box on the top right of this page. More information about Sutton Council’s HMO Article 4 Direction can be found on the council’s website.
This is intended as general advice and no liability can be accepted for any reliance upon the information provided. We would strongly encourage you to contact the Council’s Planning Department or seek independent legal advice before you start an HMO development.
We understand the challenges of being a private landlord and have created a Landlord Suppliers Directory to help you find 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, need a fire risk assessment or an EPC, 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 representation at First-tier Tribunal appeals, we help to ensure your property business remains compliant. If you need assistance, please drop us a line.
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
Latest News
Consultations
There are currently no licensing consultations we are aware of in the London Borough of Sutton
