Hackney HMO Licence: Additional vs Mandatory and Who Needs Which

Two HMO Schemes, Both Borough-Wide

Hackney Council runs two HMO licensing schemes that apply across all 21 wards — not just the 17 selective licensing wards. If your property is shared by three or more people from separate households, it almost certainly needs an HMO licence.

Mandatory HMO licensing applies to any property occupied by five or more people from two or more households who share a kitchen, bathroom or toilet. This is a national requirement under Part 2 of the Housing Act 2004. There is no storey requirement — the old three-storey test was abolished in 2018.

Additional HMO licensing applies to properties occupied by three or four people from two or more households sharing facilities. This is Hackney's local designation, running from 1 May 2026 to 30 April 2031.

Both carry a standard fee of £1,400 (£840 Part A, £560 Part B).

What Counts as a Separate Household?

This is where most landlords trip up. Under section 258 of the Housing Act 2004, a household is:

• A single person living alone
• A couple (married, civil partners, or cohabiting)
• A family unit including parents, children, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, step-relations and half-relations

Anyone who does not belong to the same family counts as a separate household. Three working professionals sharing a flat — even if they signed a single joint tenancy — form three households. The tenancy agreement does not determine the household count; the actual living arrangement does.

This catches many Hackney landlords off-guard. A two-bed flat rented to three unrelated friends looks like a standard joint tenancy, but under the Housing Act it is an HMO with three households. That triggers the additional HMO licence requirement borough-wide, including in the four wards excluded from selective licensing.

Section 257 Converted Blocks

Hackney's additional HMO licensing scheme explicitly excludes section 257 HMOs. These are buildings converted into self-contained flats where the conversion did not comply with the 1991 Building Regulations and fewer than two-thirds of the flats are owner-occupied.

The whole building does not need an additional HMO licence. However, individual flats within a section 257 block are still subject to:

• Selective licensing (if in one of the 17 designated wards and let to a single household or two sharers)
• Mandatory HMO licensing (if an individual flat has five or more occupants from separate households)

The Joint Tenancy Trap

Landlords often assume a joint tenancy agreement means the occupants form one household. They do not. Hackney Council and the First-tier Tribunal look at the occupants' actual relationships, not the paperwork. If you rent to two couples and a single person on a joint tenancy, that is three households and the property needs an additional HMO licence.

Tenants are increasingly aware of this. Forum posts on r/HousingUK show renters in Hackney checking the public register and using unlicensed status as leverage in rent disputes or rent repayment order applications.

What You Need to Do

If your property has three or more occupants from separate households, determine whether it falls under the additional or mandatory threshold, then apply through the Hackney licensing portal at propertylicensing.hackney.gov.uk.

Our Hackney landlord licensing guide covers the full decision framework, application documents, the two-part fee structure and discount stacking, room measurement rules for HMOs, and a dated compliance checklist.

See more England guides →