Hi, and welcome to today's video. We're going to be looking at the HMO requirements in terms
of fire safety when it comes to your next refurbishment project or your next HMO property.
Now, there's a couple of things to consider when it comes to buying and running an HMO
as a landlord and a property investor that you don't necessarily consider if it's a straightforward
buy to let quite as much. Part of this has to do with the fire regulations and
requirements to make sure that a property is up to standards. Make sure it's suitable
for multiple tenants living in that property, and ultimately for tenants that sometimes
don't necessarily integrate or speak to each other on a regular basis.
What you don't want to have, that you don't tend to have in family kind of properties
is where you have rooms locked, you can't get out, and you don't know, we don't have
a clear exit route essentially. When it comes to the fire regulations around HMO properties
what I'd suggest is to speak to your local HMO housing officer. Now, a lot of who are
people who are investors get worried about this because they think the HMO officer is going
to give them a ream of different requirements of what they need to do to the property and
it's going to be very expensive and it's not going to be needed, all this kind of stuff.
Often it's a misconception.
What the HMO officer's there to do is make sure that property is safe for use, fit for
purpose essentially. When you get the HMO officer on the phone, when you speak to them,
they'll very often offer to come and have a look at the property for you for free. They'll
come down and give you advice and tips on how you can make sure that that property is
sufficiently suitable for the tenant profile you're looking at, obviously to run it as
an HMO. Their advice that they give you very often is quite simple, quite straightforward,
but it means that you've got another person looking at it completely independent to yourself
to give you some very good advice and opinions on what that property needs to have from a
fire regulation point of view.
Now, we're in a recent property that we just finished from a refurb recently for an HMO
and there's a couple of things that you need to consider that we've obviously done on that
particular property that will give you a bit of an insight into the fire regulations. First
of all, thumb turn locks on the bedroom doors and also the front door and the back door
so any exit routes essentially. That's key because what you don't want to be having is
a fire on the property and a tenant not being able to find a key to get out of that room
or a key to get out the front door or the back door if it's locked or been misplaced.
That's obviously going to cause major issues.
For health and safety aspects you want to make sure the tenant's got a clear route of
exit and that's why thumb turn locks essentially on the inside of the doors allow people to
get that quick exit route out of the property. Fire doors as well, that's massively important
when it comes to fire routes. You need to make sure that that route is protected so
ultimately if you're coming down from a bedroom down the stairs, out through ... A lot of
houses are kind of created like that, out through a hallway corridor door, out through
the front door maybe or the back door of the building, any particular high risk area, so
maybe the kitchen is completely separated with fire doors so you don't have, therefore,
the exit route exposed.
On a particular property that we've just done now we've got five bedrooms, community.lounge,
kitchen area, all the bedrooms have fire doors. The kitchen has two fire doors on it, one
at one entry point, another at the other entry point. The community lounge has a fire door
on it. Ultimately, all of those areas are sufficiently protected so if there's a fire
in a particular part of the building people have enough time, warning, to get out of the
property with clear routes of exit. That's where it's key to to try and speak to your
local HMO officer because they can come out and have a look at the building and assess
it directly on this building's merits and where they feel like you need to make these
improvement from a fire standpoint, essentially.
That's very hard for me to give you over a video because each property is going to be
different, so it's well worth speaking to your local HMO officer. Obviously, fire doors,
things like fire [inaudible 00:04:00] strips, making sure it's got the door closures on,
all of that is key as well. Things like fire alarms, so all of the bedrooms and the corridors
and the communal areas, they should all have fire alarms in them. You should have a heat
fire alarm in all those key places ... Sorry, a smoke fire alarm in all those key places
and a heat fire alarm in the kitchen. They can be integrated or they should be integrated
so if one goes off the rest go off in the building.
Depending upon the size of your HMO you may also need to look at upgrading that fire alarm
system to a panel system. That is dictated somewhat by the amount of rooms, amount of
bedroom spaces, and people you have in that particular property. Again, that can go back
to speaking to your local housing office and asking them what the requirements are for
your particular area, your particular council, and the property and the size and the number
of tenants you're putting into that property so that you can make sure it's sufficiently
protected and obviously tics all the boxes from a fire and health and safety point of
view.
I hope that helps. I hope that gives you a bit of an insight in terms of what's required
when it comes to looking at the fire requirements for your next HMO. We'll put down in a link
on some of this video as well some of the videos regarding HMOs, regulations, things
like that so you can make sure you follow it to scratch when it comes to viewing your
next, or purchasing your next HMO property. Hope that helps.
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