This consultation is for The Council Tax (Chargeable Dwellings) (Wales) Regulations 2025, and is open until 26 November 2024 It seeks views on draft Regulations:
- to ensure HMOs are banded as a single property with 1 Council Tax band
- to ensure the HMO owner remains liable for Council Tax
To achieve this, we are proposing to disapply the CouncilTax (Chargeable Dwellings) Order 1992 (“the 1992 Order”) and the Council Tax(Liability for Owners) Regulations 1992 (“the 1992 Regulations”) in relation toWales and make the Council Tax (Chargeable dwellings) (Wales) Regulations 2025and the Council Tax (Liability for Owners) (Wales) Regulations 2025.
The new Regulations would replicate the existingprovisions from the 1992 Order and 1992 Regulations that apply to Wales andinclude new provisions so that HMO properties are aggregated and treated as asingle dwelling for Council Tax purposes. The Regulations would also expand theprescribed class of HMO for which the owner is responsible for paying CouncilTax. Regulation 4 of the Council Tax (Liability for Owners) (Wales) Regulations2025 transfers the liability to pay Council Tax to the person who has the mostinferior interest (whether freehold or leasehold) in the whole of the dwellingor, where there is no such person, the freeholder of the whole or any part ofthe dwelling, rather than to the owner. For the purposes of this document, theterm ‘owner’ will be used but in relation to HMOs, this will mean the personoutlined above.
See
here for the draft Regulations and
here for the link to the open consultation