Council homes in exclusive London neighbourhoods seized in illegal sub-letting crackdown

Council homes in some of central London’s most exclusive neighbourhoods have been seized after social tenants were found illegally subletting them or leaving them empty.Westminster council recovered 13 properties between April and September as it stepped up its crackdown on housing fraud. Mayfair, Maida Vale, St John’s Wood, Paddington, Soho and Pimlico were among the areas where investigators uncovered tenancy breaches and recovered the flats.Six one-bedroom, five two-bedroom and two three-bedroom properties were recovered by the town hall. Westminster’s Corporate Anti-Fraud Service (CAFS) currently has 248 live cases, more than a third of which were opened between April 1 and September 30, according to the local authority’s Mid-Year Counter Fraud Report. A flat in the heart of Soho was among those recovered by Westminster council AFP/GettyIt states: “Tenancy fraud remains a high-risk issue, sometimes accounting for over 65% of the investigator's caseload. “Investigation methods can be resource-intensive, although CAFS continue to explore the use of technology alongside the full extent of legislation to tackle this fraud type as efficiently as possible.”The council said the anti-fraud team “generated 39 positive outcomes” over the six-month period, which had saved an estimated £476,430 and “identified a notional loss of £336,915”. It comes after the borough earlier this year prosecuted a man who fraudulently obtained a council flat near Buckingham Palace.Read MoreHe was ordered to pay back £500,000 after buying the Pimlico property under the Right to Buy scheme, receiving a £100,000 discount on the sale.A number of London boroughs have launched a crackdown on tenancy fraud in recent years as the cost of housing the homeless in temporary accommodation puts a major strain on budgets.Hammersmith and Fulham said it has launched probes into 33 properties in 2025 and 2026.