Landlord Wants Higher Rent After Learning I Work From Home – Is This Even Legal?

The only potential I could envisage any justification were if you were in a ‘bills inclusive’ arrangement, so your working from home may lead to greater use of utilities, especially heating. If that’s not what you have, your LL’s argument is hogwash.

Maybe (tongue in cheek) offer a ‘turnover rent’, a % of earnings which will sometimes be good but sometimes not, so he takes the rough with the smooth. I’ll bet he’d refuse unless he could impose a guaranteed minimum in his favour.

I use the NRLA tenancy agreement, and it says working from home is fine, but not running a business from the address. It would also cause issues with my insurance. I am also so annoyed by bailiffs turning up to houses, scaring current tenants, because ex-tenants have not paid HMRC and not updated their address on Companies House. Its so much harder to deal with than personal debt.
I would ask more questions to the tenant, as long as they don’t set up an LTD company, I would probably be fine with it. If they have an LTD company, I would be left with no choice but to evict.

Find a better place to live with a more sympathetic landlord

I agree its unfair.
Like when the previous government introduced S24. We want more of your profit .
Like when governments talk about any changes to the current rules and regulations that mean a landlord will be worse off through no fault of their own.

Landlord set out the smallest bedroom as wfh space and charge the market rent!

Reply to the comment left by No hate plz at 14/08/2025 – 11:24
Does HMRC really send Bailiffs? I’m chasing a con artist trying to dissolve a string of companies. I would love to know how to get them to go after him.. but why would they waste money before checking the person actually still is at the address stated?

Assuming this is a true narrative, the landlord sounds like a bully and an idiot. Would he try and increase the rent if the tenant got a pay rise or changed jobs? The comment about finding a new tenant ” who goes to work each day” just shows someone stuck in the past and basically resenting the fact the tenant is working for themselves and being successful.
I agree the tenant should not have been so open about their financial affairs. One way to push back would be to pay no or reduced rent for a month or two, saying her blog income has dropped recently and she’s working hard to build it up again. But I realise this risks being a red rag to a stupid bull.
For those who suggest the tenant just moves out, do they not realise it’s often very hard nowadays to find a new place of acceptable quality and price? Tenants in significant parts of the country face real fears of homelessness because of high demand and falling supply as Government policies force landlords to leave the PRS and deploy their capital in more reliable and less risky ways, like in equities, debt reduction and even UK government bonds paying close to 5% due to its inability to live within its means and it’s general uselessness.

Furthermore, why should the tenant have to move out? Once the RRB becomes an Act, the tenant will have much more power to resists this sort of landlord behaviour, which is exactly what gives the PRS a bad name, albeit generally unfairly.

A likely fictional distraction that promote blogger income by stoking division.

If there was an abundance of property and choice the story would be very different. Eg Dick landlord asks for more money and instead hairdresser cum blog guy moves to cheaper and better and plentiful housing.

The questions I would ask are:- Why are we harrying and vilifying Landlords and not addressing the issue of housing shortage? and who is responsible for that? Why is this government not providing the homes people need, why are we not seeing new homes being built?

frankly, asking for more rent when you work from home is barmy – this is the kind of landlord we don’t need. ALL of my tenants work from home for at least 2 or 3 days a week

Reply to the comment left by Paul Smith at 15/08/2025 – 07:52This may be ‘story’, but it involves a landlord who gives the industry a bad name and feeds the likes GenRent and shelter, although the latter has been very quiet of late. False or not, this ‘landlord’ should be called out by decent landlords.