Do I have to include my child on rental application.

[BeShyMember]

Do I legally have to put on my rental application that I have a child?

My child’s father and I share custody of our 2 year old son. I work nights, he works days. I will have our son from 6am-3pm weeknights and overnights on the weekend. His father will have him the rest of the time. As my son is only staying overnight 2 days a week do I legally need to include him in my rental application.
we have previously been turned down for properties before because the landlords said no immediately to children.
I understand it is always best to be honest and it may be morally wrong but I don’t have many options as I need to stay in a specific area and I am worried I won’t find anywhere to live.

Yes. If you don't include him and they find out then you will be in breach of your rental agreement.

Of course you have to include your child if they're going to be living there!

Technically your child only stays with you at the weekend, so if you think it’d help your application I’d leave it off.

With pets, some people don't put them on the application and then arrange for them to be elsewhere if the landlord needs to come round.

For the moment ignoring the legal aspect, you'll find it very hard to hide a 2 year old child from the landlord. You could arrange for friends to have them if the landlord needs to come around (but what it something breaks at short notice) but how are you going to hide all their stuff?

I don't think you can make this work.

If you were a grandparent looking after your grandchild 6am - 3pm and having them overnight at weekends I wouldn’t expect them to include the grandchild on the application, so I don’t think this is different.

If you really wanted to be honest you could say your child will be staying over 2 nights a week - I really wouldn’t bother though.

What does the application say exactly?

Me too.

You must be so tired!

I think you should be honest as there has to be trust if there's to be a decent relationship between tenant and landlord. You have a child and lying by omission is the not the road to a good landlord/tenant relationship in my view

I can understand the temptation to omit mention of your child but I wouldn't do it.

It only takes a nosey neighbour who knows that that particular landlord doesn't allow children to report you. Also I would find it stressful to be worrying if the LL is going to find out and be jumpy every time the doorbell rings.

Depends on the rental agreement - when my now husband was renting and i started staying regularly (as in most the time) he asked the agency about adding me and they said don't bother, I even met the landlord when he popped round to sort out a problem with the shower and he was very nice and didn't ask why a person not on the rental documents was letting him in.

This only applies to self contained accommodation with space for the number of occupants. It would be very unreasonable to have a child stay in a shared house for example without the landlord oking

And that sounds a rough schedule for all concerned.

From what you say it's not currently in action but a plan - can you not try and work something else out.

OP said "I will have our son from 6am-3pm weeknights and overnights on the weekends..."

How is this 'only at the weekend?'

I thought it was now illegal to discriminate against people who have children and want to rent.

I believe the same is true for pets.

I meant staying, as in staying overnight.

It’s one thing to hide a hamster at a landlord inspection but how would you hide an entire child’s bedroom and all their stuff?!

Obviously.
That would be quite a deciding factor for private landlords.