188a Adelphi Street, Preston, PR1 7BH
MAN/30UK/HMF/2020/0034 · Preston · decided 13 May 2021 · rent repayment order
old rules| Offence | Unlicensed HMO |
|---|---|
| Landlord | Individual |
| Applicants | 5 tenants |
| Rent | not stated as one figure |
| Period the order relates to | 25 Sep 2019 to 21 May 2020 |
| Maximum the tribunal could award | £12,179.10; £1,599.68 then deducted for utilities |
| Amount the tribunal ordered | £2,116 per applicant on average; £10,580 in total for 5 applicants |
| Share of the maximum | 87%, from the two figures above |
| Rules | Old rules (offence before 1 May 2026): maximum 12 months' rent. |
Read from the PDF automatically. Amounts are totals for the decision, across all its applicants.
From the tribunal's reasons on the amount
licence the Property. We agree. … He argues that the Property was not a mandatory HMO before the last of the five Applicants moved in on 25 September 2019, or after 30 March 2020 (when the Applicants returned home because of lockdown). … A property needs to be licensed as an HMO (and is a so-called ‘mandatory HMO’) if, among other things, it is occupied by five or more persons1. Section 262(6) of the 2004 Act provides that an ‘occupier’, in relation to premises, “means a person who occupies the premises as a residence”. Although the 2004 Act does not offer further clarification as to what constitutes occupation, we consider that the expression “occupies … as a residence” connotes something more than simply a right to occupy. So, for example, if a person takes a tenancy of premises but never moves in for some reason, they cannot be said to ‘occupy’ those premises. At the other extreme, short or transitory absences from premises occupied as one’s residence cannot reasonably be characterised as a break in occupation. … He did not ‘occupy’ the Property before this date and thus it is the date on which the offence under section 72(1) of the 2004 Act was first committed (because it was only from this date that the Property was being occupied by five or more persons). …
An extract from the part of the decision that sets the amount. To keep people's names out, any sentence that might contain one is left out (marked …). The full reasons are in the original decision.
The original
Other rent repayment orders near PR1 7BH · Licensing schemes and register for PR1 7BH
Past decisions are not a prediction. The tribunal decides each case on its facts, including the landlord's and tenant's conduct.