HMO Heating Controls: Room-by-Room Heating Without the Arguments

Every HMO with one thermostat has the same argument running through it. The tenant in the coldest room turns the heating up, the tenant in the warmest room opens a window, and the landlord pays for both. HMO heating controls that work at room level remove the argument entirely, because nobody’s setting governs anybody else’s room.

Short answer: HMO heating controls let you set each room's temperature independently, cap how high tenants can push it, and drop empty rooms back automatically. That removes the single-thermostat conflict, where one tenant's setting governs everyone, and stops you paying to heat rooms nobody is in.

The single-thermostat problem

A shared house is not one thermal space. North-facing rooms run colder, top-floor rooms run hotter, and occupancy patterns differ wildly: a night-shift worker, a student who is out all day and someone working from home all have different needs from the same system. One thermostat cannot serve all of them. Whoever gets to it sets the temperature for the building, and everyone else compensates smart thermostat for landlords. The tenant who is too warm opens a window rather than negotiating. The tenant who is too cold buys a plug-in heater, which is the single most expensive way to heat a room and, in a bills-included let, lands straight on your electricity bill. The waste is not really caused by inconsiderate tenants. It is caused by a control system that gives them no way to be considerate.

What room-by-room HMO heating controls change

Fitting controls at radiator level turns each room into its own zone with its own target temperature and its own schedule. Practically, three things follow:

Rooms stop fighting each other. The warm room runs cooler, the cold room runs warmer, and neither tenant has to touch a shared dial.
Empty rooms stop costing money. A room can drop to a holding temperature when nobody is in it and be back up to comfort before they return. In a five or six bed HMO with variable occupancy, this is usually the single largest saving available.
You can see what is actually happening. Room-level temperature history tells you which rooms run cold, which run hot and which have a window open, which is information you simply do not have with one thermostat in a hallway.

The HMO smart heating page covers the system itself, and our HMO buyer’s guide works through specification in more detail.

Setting caps that keep everyone warm enough

The point of a cap is not to keep tenants cold, it is to remove the extremes. Most HMO landlords settle on an upper limit around 21 to 22°C and a floor around 16 to 17°C. Within that range tenants adjust their own room freely. The floor matters more than landlords expect. A tenant trying to save money on a bills-excluded let may turn their room off completely, and a cold room in a house full of showers and drying laundry is where condensation and mould begin. Holding a minimum protects the fabric of the building and reduces the risk of a disrepair claim later. It is worth putting the arrangement in writing at the start of the tenancy. Tenants who understand that they control their own room within a sensible band very rarely object; tenants who discover a limit by surprise in December sometimes do.

If you are still deciding what to fit, our guide to the best thermostat for an HMO compares the options room by room.

The other money leaks in an HMO

Beyond temperature, four things quietly drive HMO heating costs up:

Open windows with the radiator running. Open-window detection drops the radiator automatically and restores it when the window closes.
Boosts that never get cancelled. Time-limited boosts return to schedule on their own.
Hot water held at temperature all day for a house whose demand is concentrated into two short periods.
Communal areas heated to bedroom temperatures around the clock, when hallways and landings rarely need it.

Our guide to what it costs to heat an HMO in 2026 breaks the numbers down, and smart heating and hot water controls covers the cylinder side.

Retrofitting an HMO that is already occupied

Most landlords assume this means disruption. In practice, wireless radiator controls and room sensors avoid re-wiring and replastering, so a typical HMO is done in a day with tenants in place. Access to each room is the constraint rather than the work itself, which is why installations are usually arranged room by room around tenants’ availability.

Turnover is the easiest window. Fitting controls between tenancies removes the access problem completely, and it means the settings are established before the new tenant arrives rather than being imposed on someone mid-tenancy.

Our installation and project management team handles the scheduling. You can see how this has worked across managed portfolios in our case studies with Comet Homes and John Winter Houses.

Frequently asked questions

What are HMO heating controls?
They are heating controls that work at room level rather than whole-property level, so each bedroom has its own target temperature, schedule and limits. That suits HMOs, where occupancy and comfort needs differ from room to room.

Can tenants still control the heating in their own room?
Yes. Tenants adjust their own room within the range you set. They cannot change another tenant’s room or push their own beyond your cap, which is what removes the arguments.

Will room-by-room control reduce heating bills in an HMO?
The largest saving usually comes from not heating unoccupied rooms and from stopping heat going out of open windows. How much that is worth depends on the property, its occupancy pattern and how it was being run before.

Is installing HMO heating controls disruptive for tenants?
Not usually. Wireless radiator controls avoid re-wiring, so most HMOs are completed in a day with tenants in place. Access to each room is the main scheduling consideration.

If your HMO is running on one thermostat and a monthly argument, we can show you what room-level control would look like in your property.