A West London council has approved plans for a family home to be converted into a 10-bedroom HMO (House in Multiple Occupation).
The Acton home had previously been a four-bedroom house. An HMO is a house or flat, occupied by people who do not form a single household, where they share one or more basic amenity, such as a bathroom and cooking facilities.
Under the new plans, recently approved by Ealing Council, the “family rooms”, and attic will be converted into bedrooms for potential new residents. The garage will also be converted into a “habitable room”, meaning there will be nine bedrooms inside the house plus the converted garage.
The landlord hopes that 21 Gunnersbury Crescent will soon be home to 10 individuals. The house will have two kitchens, one on the ground floor, one on the first floor, and one communal living area.
The application, now subject to a legal agreement, has been granted with several conditions. These include maintaining the current appearance of the building and a ban on balconies.
The council has also ruled that there must be no cooking facilities within any individual bedrooms, with all cooking to take place in one of the two communal kitchens. This is to “prevent the overdevelopment of the site and the creation of self-contained residential units”.
Any future occupants are also banned from obtaining parking permits for the local controlled parking zone. Instead, the landlord must provide adequate cycle parking facilities.
Each bedroom will have an ensuite, and larger rooms than the minimum required size of 6.5 sqm. The largest bedroom is 12.34 sqm, and the smallest is 9.95sqm.
Eight objections were received by the council, including related to a risk of noise nuisance and antisocial behaviour, and the loss of a family home. On the loss of a family home, planning officers stated the loss is “regrettable”, however they point to the London Plan which “encourages a variety” of housing.
In the last 12 months, there has been an increase in concerns relating to the “overconcentration” of HMOs from Ealing residents. In June, the council approved the conversion of a family home into a HMO despite over 100 objections from residents.
At a meeting of full council in July, another resident raised concerns that he could hear his neighbour poo due to the layout and lack of insulation in an HMO next door. Ealing Council says it is taking action against HMOs, including forcing all conversions, not just large ones, to obtain planning permission from November 2025.
Philip is a Local Democracy Reporter covering Ealing, Hillingdon and Hounslow, with a focus on council decisions, housing, planning, licensing and community stories across west London.
