Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 20 July 2021 to Question 33931, what recent estimate he has made of the number of houses in multiple occupation in each (a) region and (b) London borough; and if he will make a statement.

A House in Multiple Occupation (HMO) is a property where three or more people from two or more households share facilities, such as a kitchen and/or bathroom. Under mandatory HMO licensing, all local authorities must license HMOs in which five or more people from two or more households share facilities.

The Department gathers data from local authorities on the estimated number of HMOs annually. The latest returns can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/local-authority-housing-statistics-data-returns-for-2019-to-2020.