Nottinghamshire residents have called for tighter tenant vetting procedures for HMOs after experiencing a “hostile” living environment.
The calls come from Gedling residents living on a Netherfield street after they experienced nuisance from a tenant living in a House of Multiple Occupation (HMO) on their road. HMO concerns were shared by Gedling Borough Council leader, Labour’s John Clarke, in a cabinet meeting in early September where he said HMOs in Netherfield were “spreading and they are spreading significantly”.
He referred to a resident’s impacted “quality of life” from nearby HMOs and asked for more regular updates on how many HMOs are in the borough.
Gedling is not the only Nottinghamshire authority to call for action on HMOs. In August, Bassetlaw District Council backed a call to tighten planning rules for smaller HMOs. A motion during a council meeting called for an Article 4 Direction to be introduced for the district.
Under current planning policy, changing a home to a small HMO is classed as “permitted development”, meaning planning permission from a local authority is not needed.
Article 4 Directions allow councils to withdraw these permitted development rights for HMOs across a defined area, meaning smaller HMOs would require planning permission and would allow resident consultation.
one resident, Taylor, said his partner “doesn’t feel secure” after a nearby HMO tenant’s previous incidences of fighting in the street.
He said: “You don’t know who you’re going to get. There’s not enough vetting for people as well.
“She wants to feel safe and sometimes she doesn’t want to go outside because there’s people just coming in and out [of the HMO]”, he continued, adding it is a “quite hostile” environment at times.
Another resident who has lived on the road for around two years, but asked not to be named, said: “People need somewhere to live, so I’m not against [HMOs] in any way – what my concern is there’s now some serious security issues.”
They continued: “Police are always called, they’re fighting in the streets, there have been thefts. We’ve reported it to the landlord which was quite a difficult process because it’s really not transparent who the landlord is.”
The resident added she has put cameras on the front of their house as a precaution and said they had noticed more HMOs in the area.
They said “from my perception it seems like there’s a lot on [my] street. I think because houses are older, not as well maintained, they’re cheap to buy” and added tenants need to be “vetted in some way”.
Another resident, Rob, said he thinks legislation needs to be “tighter” on private landlords, including HMO landlords. He said: “Ideally what I’d like to see is people afford their own places… I just think legislation needs to be really tight on landlords – what you can expect as a tenant.
“Netherfield’s got a lot of rented [spaces] in the smaller houses. They’re really neglected and the landlords neglect the houses – they put people in, take the rent and that’s it. I think that brings the sense of community down.”
According to the Office for National Statistics data, there are an estimated 182,554 HMO’s in England and Wales – 74 per cent of these are ‘small’ HMOs usually with three or four tenants.
Specifically for Gedling, HMOs accounted for only 0.54 per cent of homes in Netherfield – around one in 200 – and the council says there is “no evidence” of an increase in HMOs there since a previous report in December 2022.
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