Fire Safety in HMO Communal Areas: What Landlords Must Provide

A pushbike chained to the bannister, a stack of delivery boxes under the stairs, a broken chest of drawers left on the landing "just until the weekend": any one of these can earn you an enforcement notice from your local fire and rescue authority, and in a serious case a prohibition notice that legally bars part of your HMO from use until you put it right. Ignore the notice and you can be prosecuted, with unlimited fines in the most serious cases. Poor HMO communal area fire safety is where most landlords come unstuck, because the risk sits in the communal areas fire can tear through fastest: the halls and stairs you do not live in and rarely see.

Shared space works differently from a private flat. A hallway or staircase is the one route every tenant relies on to get out, so the law treats it as a protected escape route and puts the duty to keep it safe on you, the landlord or manager, not on the tenants who clutter it.

HMO communal area fire safety: who is legally responsible

Two sets of rules bite here, and they stack. The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 (the RRO 2005) applies to the common parts of any HMO: the halls, stairs, landings, shared kitchens and shared lounges used by more than one household. Under the Order you are the "responsible person" for those areas, which means you must carry out and act on a written fire risk assessment. This duty exists whether or not your council has ever mentioned it to you.

On top of that, the Management of Houses in Multiple Occupation (England) Regulations 2006 place a direct legal duty on the HMO manager to keep all means of escape free from obstruction and in good order and repair, to keep fire fighting equipment and alarms in working order, and to display escape route notices where tenants can clearly see them. Breaching those regulations is a criminal offence in its own right, separate from the RRO. The Housing Act 2004 adds a further layer: a council inspecting under the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS) can score a blocked or unprotected escape route as a serious hazard and force remedial work.

This is the position in England. Scotland and Wales run their own HMO licensing and fire safety regimes with different detail, so if your property is north of the border or in Wales, check the local standard rather than assuming the English regulations apply word for word.

Keep escape routes clear: no storage, no exceptions

The single most common failure in an HMO is stuff in the hall. Bikes, buggies, prams, shoe racks, recycling, furniture waiting for collection: none of it belongs on a protected escape route, and "there was nowhere else to put it" is not a defence when a fire officer visits. A cluttered hallway does two bad things at once. It adds fuel to a fire on the exact path people need to escape, and it trips or blocks tenants trying to get out through smoke and darkness.

The rule is simple and you should apply it without flexibility: nothing combustible and nothing that obstructs stays in the shared halls, stairs, landings or under the stairs. That includes items that look harmless, such as a coat rack piled with jackets or a stack of free newspapers. Under-stair cupboards deserve special attention, because a fire starting there sits directly beneath the route out. For the detail on widths, protected routes, final exits and travel distances, read our guide to fire escape routes in HMOs.

Working emergency lighting and clear signage

Tenants escape in the dark far more often than people expect, because a fire frequently knocks out the mains supply or fills the route with smoke. Staircases and hallways in an HMO must be lit well enough to leave safely, and where the route is long, has no borrowed light from windows, or turns through several corners, you will usually need dedicated emergency lighting that switches on automatically when the power fails. Whether your property needs it, and to what standard, is a judgement the fire risk assessment should record. Our guide to emergency lighting in HMOs sets out where it is required and how it should be tested.

Signage matters too, though the goal is clarity, not covering every wall in green signs. Fire doors on escape routes and to shared kitchens should carry "Fire Door Keep Shut". Cupboards, meter rooms and service risers that stay closed should read "Fire Door Keep Locked". Where the way out is not obvious, running-man exit signs should point the route to the final exit. A fire action notice near the main entrance, telling tenants what to do if the alarm sounds, completes the basic set.

Adequate detection in the shared parts

Detection in an HMO is designed as a system, not a scatter of separate alarms, and the communal areas are central to it. Most shared houses need a mains-powered, interlinked system built to BS 5839-6, so that a fire caught in the hallway or kitchen sounds every alarm in the building at once and wakes tenants asleep behind closed bedroom doors. The grade and category depend on the size and layout of the property, but hallways and landings on the escape route almost always need detection, because that is where a fire has to be picked up early to protect everyone above it.

Shared kitchens are the highest-risk room in most HMOs and need detection sited to catch a real fire without constant false alarms from cooking. Getting the alarm design wrong is not a minor paperwork slip: an under-specified system is one of the faults councils flag most often on inspection.

Self-closing fire doors that actually close

Fire doors are what buy tenants the time to use the escape route. In an HMO the doors between bedrooms and the hallway, and the doors onto shared kitchens and lounges, are typically fire doors fitted with self-closing devices, so they shut on their own and hold back fire and smoke long enough to let people out. A fire door only works when it is closed, which is why self-closers are a requirement and not an optional extra.

The failures officers see over and over are self-closers removed or disconnected because tenants find them annoying, doors wedged open, and gaps around the frame wide enough to let smoke pour through. Check them on every visit. For the full picture on ratings, intumescent strips, gaps and self-closers, see our guide to HMO fire door requirements.

The bikes-in-the-hall problem, solved properly

Every HMO landlord hits the same wall: tenants treat the communal hallway as extra storage, and the moment you clear it, the clutter comes back. Asking politely once does not work. Here is how to hold the line.

• Write it into the tenancy agreement. A clear clause banning any storage of belongings, bikes or waste in halls, stairs and landings gives you the authority to act.
• Provide an alternative. If you have room, a bike rack or a lockable store away from the escape route removes the excuse before it starts.
• Inspect on a fixed programme. Regular, recorded inspections of the communal parts are expected under the Management Regulations, and they let you catch problems while they are small.
• Act in writing. When items appear, issue a dated written notice to remove them by a deadline, then remove them yourself if they are not gone. Keep the record.

Next steps

Walk your HMO tonight and look at the shared parts with an inspector's eye: is the hall clear, does the emergency light work, do the fire doors close on their own, does the alarm cover the escape route? Then record what you find in a proper written assessment, because a duty you cannot evidence is a duty a court treats as undone. FRASafe guides you through a BS 9792:2025-aligned fire risk assessment, free to complete, with a council-ready PDF for £45. Start with the shared areas, fix what the assessment flags, and keep the record where you can produce it the day an inspector knocks.