HMO and selective licensing

Some councils require a licence to let — always for a large HMO, and in some areas for every rental.

Abodient tracks the licence once you have established whether you need one. Working out whether you do is a step only you can take.

Abodient does not look this up for you

On a property's Property Details → Compliance triggers, you answer Selective licensing in this area? — Licensed, No, or Not sure.

There is no postcode lookup behind it: the answer is yours to find. Most councils publish a checker, so search your council's site for "selective licensing", or call their licensing team.

Answer Licensed and a licence duty appears. Answer Not sure and nothing is created — which keeps your risk figure honest, but also means you are told nothing, so it is worth resolving.

HMO licences appear on their own

You do not answer a licensing question for an HMO. Say a property is an HMO in the same Compliance triggers, and an HMO Licence duty appears by itself.

Recording the licence

Once the duty exists it behaves like a certificate: upload the licence, confirm its expiry, and it turns valid and counts on the Compliance page. It sits under the Licensing category there.

The upload and confirmation work the same for any document — "How we read your documents" shows those screens.

If licensing does not look right

• Sure you need one but see no duty? Check the two answers — "Selective licensing" set to Licensed, or "HMO" set to Yes. Nothing appears until one of them is.
• Looking for a building's registration? Building Safety Act registration is a duty of the building, not the flat — find it on the building's own page, not a single property's.