Parents looking to buy a house for their children at university could be caught out by new rules, warns finance guide, Business Moneyfacts.

The new rules are designed to regulate landlords of houses of multiple occupation – properties which house more than three unrelated people. If a house is more than three storeys high and has five or more tenants living in it then, under the new rules, it will have to be licensed.

The cost of a five-year license will be worked out based on the number of habitable rooms – bedrooms, living room and dining room. Bathrooms and kitchens will be excluded

Business Moneyfacts editor, Nikki Cann, said: “Parents may already have problems getting a buy-to-let mortgage for their children following mortgage regulation last year. This new regulation is meant to target disreputable landlords of run-down houses, but parents who buy houses for their children could find themselves caught as well.”