A tenant who discovered that his landlord had not licenced the HMO in which he lived is to pocket £5,000 after winning a rent repayment order (RRO) during a Tribunal hearing.

The case is a warning to landlords who do not licence their properties as increasingly tenants become aware that they can claim substantial sums via RROs.

These empower tenants to claim back all of their rent for up to 12 months if a property is not licenced either through additional or selective licencing schemes.

In this latest case Nathan Levenstein took landlord Gauhar Khan to a Tribunal, claiming his annual rent of £8,600 for a room within an HMO operated by the landlord in Balham, SW London (pictured).

Levenstein made the claim only after Khan revealed that he intended to sell the property and would require all the tenants to move out.

Aggravating

The tribunal awarded him £5,000, illustrating how landlords can persuade Tribunals to reduce RRO claims, in this case because the property was in a good condition, the landlord was in financial difficulties, it was their first offence and there were no other aggravating factors.

Also, utility bills of approximately £1,000 were included in the rent and this was deducted from total claimed.

Khan revealed during the hearing that he had inherited the house from his father and, after remortgaging it to pay off his siblings and taking out further loans to upgrade the property, it made a loss.

He also argued that he did not register the property via Lambeth council’s additional licencing scheme because his mortgage did not permit the house to be rented out as an HMO.

Khan now has a month to appeal the decision.‍