Nottingham landlords and consequently tenants will suffer increased rents as the City council's licensing scheme costs are going to go sky high.

canstockphoto.com

The city council introduced selective licensing in August 2018 in its efforts to cut down the number of rogue landlords and unsafe properties.

According to the council there are around 32,000 properties in the city that need a licence to ensure proper living standards are provided. As with other authorities the council has been granted powers to issue fines of up to £30,000 to landlords whose properties do not meet the necessary requirements, or fail to sign up to the scheme.

It claims that approximately just over half of the 32,000 properties are licensed.

Costs for the license are £480 per property for accredited landlords with non-accredited landlords having to pay £780 per property for a five year term.

The council has just dropped its bombshell that the costs are going to be increased from March 2020, to £670 per property for accredited landlords and £890 for non accredited owners, for five years.

There are considerable concerns that the council is penalising good landlords who have already met the standard requirements set by the authority.

Giles Inman, business development manager of a trade association is adamant that the major hike will cause major eruptions.

Inman said: "It is clearly going to bring higher rents and we are going to see smaller landlords selling up. It is also going to fuel the homelessness problem in the city.

"What they should be doing is having an action plan to fine the applicants they are chasing. It is just another nail in the coffin for Nottingham landlords.

"This is a PR disaster. It is just telling businesses they are being taxed and taxed. We are businesses, not husbands and wives running a cottage industry.

"I can't think of another scheme that has put their fees up so soon after it has started.

"It is not good enough. We want to offer affordable rents but we are being squeezed out."

He claims that the licensing scheme has had little effect in the number of inspections and subsequent prosecutions carried out by the council and the increase will have a real impact on "new landlords and existing landlords that are expanding their portfolio."

He continued: "All the existing ones that have paid will have to pay again in August 2023 when it comes up for renewal.

"Are they going to keep sticking it up? We have no consistency or a plan of action.

"This scheme is not doing what it is says it is doing. It was a scheme to raise standards and reduce anti-social behaviour.

"If they are not inspecting how can you protect and safeguard tenants."

Nottingham City council will not or is unable to release the number of inspections carried out by their team, however some landlords have estimated that around 176 have been carried out by the 75 strong team.

The council has disclosed that the scheme's value has risen by around £173,000 which is now estimated to be £24.2m.

It has also admitted that there "continues to be a number of risks and uncertainties regarding the scheme."

According to Zoopla in October, Nottingham was cited as having the biggest percentage of rent increases in the whole of England. Over the past twelve months rental growth in the city has risen from 4.3% to 5.4% with an average monthly rent of £661.

The increase is higher than Leeds, Bristol, Leicester, Derby, York, Brighton, Liverpool and Sheffield; however this does not necessarily mean that Nottingham tenants pay more than tenants living in other cities.

When the council implemented the licensing scheme, landlords say that tenants would end up having to pay for the scheme, and would probably have to pay, on average an extra £25 per month.

A Nottingham City Council spokeswoman said: "We are increasing fees for individual house licences.

"The scheme is self-funding and the council has reviewed the licensing process and found it wasn’t recovering all of the costs, so fees have to increase to reflect that – but it remains the case that we are not allowed to make a profit from licence fees.

"Over 18,000 landlords have already applied at the lower rate and we will work to engage with landlords who are not registered for the scheme - we would urge any of them to apply before the price rise at the end of March.

"We are also changing the way licences are applied to blocks of flats in the city, so that instead of applying for each individual apartment, there is the option for an applicant to apply to licence the whole block - subject to certain criteria being met within the new policy."