Selective licensing in City of Westminster

What the designation says

Westminster operates a selective licensing scheme covering 15 of the city's 18 wards, which went live on 24 November 2025. It applies to privately rented homes let to a single household, including those occupied by one or two people, and excludes houses in multiple occupation already covered by the mandatory or additional HMO schemes — a property licensed under one of those does not need a selective licence as well. Because three of the eighteen wards are outside the designation, a landlord should check a specific address against the council's published boundary rather than assume the whole city is covered. Letting an unlicensed property inside a designated ward is a criminal offence carrying a civil penalty of up to £30,000 or prosecution, and exposes the landlord to a rent repayment order.

What this means for a landlord

A licence must be in place before the property is let, not applied for afterwards. Operating unlicensed in a designated area is a criminal offence: a civil penalty of up to £30,000 per offence, a rent repayment order of up to twelve months' rent, and a section 21 notice that cannot be served while the property is unlicensed. Mandatory HMO licensing applies separately and everywhere, wherever a property is let to five or more people forming two or more households.

City of Westminster's own licensing page →