Possible plans to increase licensing for houses with multiple occupation (HMOs) will have no affect on the average buy-to-let investor, according to the Association of Residential Lettings Agents (ARLA).

Responding to suggestions that such moves in university towns with high numbers of HMOs could have an effect on investors, spokesman Malcolm Harrison said: “HMOs are very much for the professional end of the market, it’s not for typical buy-to-let investment”.

He suggested that this would pass by the ‘middle’ buy-to-let market ‘because that’s not really where they are’, and concluded that any market saturation of such homes in university towns would be prevented by the market rather than licensing. The suggestion that there is a saturation of HMOs is one that has been applied to a number of university towns.

It is one of the issues being examined in the review of HMOs by Housing Minister Caroline Flint.