An amnesty for unlicensed shared properties is being held after a court ordered landlords to pay more than£10,000.

Owners and managers of large houses divided up into bedsits or shared houses, have until July 31 to apply for a licence without fear of enforcement.

The amnesty follows a prosecution which saw a rental company ordered to pay more than £10,000 in fines and costs over an unlicensed property in Rodborough Road, Golders Green.

Knights Island Capital Ltd - trading under the name of Endeavour Living - and its two directors, Nikola Bonacic and Ben Patrick, pleaded guilty to failing to license a shared house at Willesden Magistrates’ Court last month.

The prosecution came after a tenant at the house contacted Barnet council with complaints about safety.

The company denied it needed a licence, but a visit by environmental health officers found it had been turned into eight bedsits, with insufficient smoke alarms.

Alun Parfitt, director of Re, a joint venture between the council and outsourcing firm Capita, said: “The company and directors in this case acted unscrupulously and held no regard for any of the tenants or their personal safety. The high fines and costs send a strong message that we are making sure these rogue landlords are held accountable.”

Only large shared houses that are at least three storeys high with five or more tenants sharing facilities, require licences.