®Planning appeal decision
Dismissed30 July 20243323963
154 Selwyn Avenue, LONDON, E4 9LS
use of property as a small house in multiple occupation (HMO) (Use Class C4)
- Authority
- Waltham Forest London Borough Council
- Appeal type
- ldc · Lawful Development Certificate
- Procedure
- Written Representations
- Development
- residential · Minor Dwellings
- Inspector
- Pleasant L
Main issues, as the Inspector framed them
- Whether the Council's decision to refuse to grant a certificate of lawful use or development was well founded, turning on whether the appellant can demonstrate on the balance of probabilities that the change of use to a small house in multiple occupation took place more than ten years before the date of the application and continued without significant interruption thereafter, so as to be immune from enforcement action
What decided it
The tenancy agreements each related to single occupiers only with no evidence of multiple unrelated persons occupying the property at the same time, and agreements from 2015 onwards explicitly prohibited subletting and multiple occupation, meaning the property could not be demonstrated to have been in use as an HMO for the required ten-year period.
The main issues and the deciding factor are read from the published letter by Town Planner Pro; the letter itself is the record. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Research, not advice.