Letting agents for HMOs

Last reviewed 3 October 2026 · Published by madeofmango · Covers England

This guide covers England. It is not legal advice, and the government guidance it draws on is dated (the GOV.UK pages cited were last updated in 2019), so always check the current position with your local council.

Three kinds of HMO-related licensing

• Mandatory licensing. According to GOV.UK, an HMO needs a mandatory licence when it is occupied by five or more people from two or more separate households. Since 1 October 2018 this is no longer limited to buildings of three or more storeys.
• Additional licensing. A council can designate an area where HMOs that fall outside mandatory licensing also need a licence, if it believes there are problems that justify it. Whether this applies, and to which HMOs, depends on the council.
• Selective licensing. A separate kind of council scheme, set up for a designated area. Councils decide where and whether to use it.

Additional and selective schemes differ from council to council and can start, change or end. Ask the council whose area your property is in what applies to that address, and do not rely on a general guide, including this one.

What licences typically cover

GOV.UK says licences for HMOs carry conditions on fire safety, gas safety, electrical appliance safety and furniture safety, plus waste disposal and minimum sleeping-room sizes. The national minimum floor areas for sleeping rooms are 6.51 m² for one person over 10, 10.22 m² for two people over 10 and 4.64 m² for one child under 10, and a room under 4.64 m² cannot be used for sleeping. Councils can set further conditions, so the licence your council issues is the document that counts.

Questions to ask an HMO letting agent

These are questions to put to any agent you are considering, not claims about any particular agency.

• Which licence, if any, applies to my property under my council’s rules, and who applies for it and renews it, you or me?
• Can you show me licences you currently handle for other landlords, and how you track their conditions and expiry dates?
• How do you manage fire safety: fire alarm and door checks, risk assessments, and records of when they were done?
• How do you handle gas safety, electrical safety and the other compliance checks that a licence requires?
• Do you let room by room, on one joint tenancy, or both? How do you handle a sharer leaving and a replacement moving in?
• How do you deal with shared-area cleaning, bills, waste and neighbour complaints?
• What does your fee cover for an HMO, and is it a different percentage or fee schedule from a standard let?
• Which redress scheme and client money protection do you hold, and where can I check them?

For checks that apply to every agent, see how to choose a letting agent. For how fees add up, see letting agent fees for landlords.

Find HMO-specialist agencies

madeofmango lets you filter agencies by the specialism they say they have, including HMO. Coverage currently starts in East London (Canning Town, Royal Victoria, Custom House and the rest of E16) and is expanding outwards, so searches elsewhere may return no agencies yet. A listing shows what an agency says about itself and which compliance details were checked against a register; it is not a recommendation.

Search HMO agencies in E16