When is an aparthotel a higher-risk building?

Hotels have largely escaped the delays that the Building Safety Act 2022 has brought to tall residential development. A building used entirely as a hotel falls outside the higher-risk building regime. A new hotel tower therefore does not need approval from the Building Safety Regulator before work starts, and does not need to be registered before guests arrive.

Aparthotels are less straightforward. They combine hotel-style operation with self-contained, apartment-style accommodation, and often cater for guests staying weeks or months rather than nights. The legislation does not say where a hotel ends and residential accommodation begins. For developers, operators, landlords and funders, whether an aparthotel counts as a hotel can decide whether a tall scheme passes through the full higher-risk regime or sits outside it altogether.

What is at stake

A building that is at least 18 metres high or has at least seven storeys, and contains at least two residential units, is a higher-risk building. For a new building, that brings the Gateway 2 approval process before construction and a completion certificate before occupation. The regulator’s most recent figures show a median approval time of 22 weeks for new build applications at Gateway 2.

The consequences continue after completion. An occupied higher-risk building must be registered before residents move in, and it is an offence to allow occupation of an unregistered building. Whoever holds a legal estate in possession of the common parts becomes an accountable person, with continuing statutory duties to manage building safety risks.

A scheme that is wrongly assumed to fall within the hotel exclusion therefore risks more than a paperwork problem. It could be built without the approvals the law requires, and occupied in breach of the registration rules.

The hotel exclusion

The exclusion is found in the Higher-Risk Buildings (Descriptions and Supplementary Provisions) Regulations 2023. It removes from the regime a building that comprises entirely of a hotel. The regulations do not define what a hotel is.

Government guidance fills part of that gap. It describes hotels as buildings that provide overnight accommodation for customers staying for leisure or business. It also says that hotels are excluded regardless of how long individual customers stay. Hostels providing overnight accommodation on the same basis are treated as a type of hotel.

The government’s explanation for the exclusion is also revealing. It pointed to hotels being regulated under the Fire Safety Order, and to their generally having round-the-clock staffing, multiple escape routes, emergency lighting and signage, and better fire detection and alarm provision than a typical block of flats. Those operational features, rather than the label on the building, explain why hotels were treated differently.

Serviced apartments are not hotels

The same guidance draws a clear line on serviced apartments. They do not fall within the meaning of hotel, and a building of serviced apartments that meets the height or storey threshold is a higher-risk building. The guidance on the occupation phase goes further, confirming that a short-term let, such as a property let online, counts as a residential unit.

That leaves aparthotels in the space between two categories the guidance does address. An aparthotel operated in every practical sense as a hotel may fall within the exclusion. One whose units look, feel and function like serviced apartments may not, however it is branded.

Where the line may fall

Whether a particular aparthotel is a hotel for these purposes is a question of fact. There is no checklist in the legislation, but the government’s own reasoning points to the features likely to matter.

Staffing is an obvious one. A building with a staffed reception and management presence at all hours sits more comfortably within the hotel concept than one relying on remote check-in and digital access. The way units are let and serviced is another. Nightly bookings, housekeeping and hotel-style terms suggest a hotel, while tenancy-style agreements and self-sufficient occupation point the other way. The design of the building matters too, including its escape routes, fire detection and alarm systems.

Length of stay is less decisive than it might appear. The guidance says a hotel remains a hotel however long its guests stay. The real question is whether the building is operated as a hotel at all, and a long-stay model may make that harder to demonstrate.

Mixed-use schemes

The exclusion applies only where a building comprises entirely of a hotel. A tower combining hotel floors with residential apartments is not used entirely as a hotel, so the exclusion does not simply carve out the hotel element. The rules on when different parts of a building can be treated separately are technical, and turn on matters such as access and the relationship between the uses. Early engagement with the regulator on a mixed scheme can avoid an expensive surprise at Gateway 2.

The landlord and tenant dimension

Much of the commentary on this issue focuses on developers. The risk does not end at completion, however, and it can arise from decisions made years later by an operator.

Consider a landlord that lets a completed tower to an aparthotel operator on the footing that it falls within the hotel exclusion. If the operator, or a successor on assignment, moves towards remote management, longer tenancy-style stays or serviced apartment branding, the building’s status may shift. The landlord, as holder of the legal estate in the common parts, could find itself an accountable person for an unregistered higher-risk building.

Lease drafting can address that risk. A carefully framed user clause can tie the permitted use to hotel operation, rather than a looser description such as serviced accommodation. Covenants can require the tenant to maintain the operational features on which the exclusion depends, to notify the landlord of changes to its operating model, and to share the information needed to monitor compliance. Alienation provisions deserve similar attention, since an assignee may run the same building on a very different model.

Operators have their own interest in clarity. A tenant taking a lease of a building that turns out to be a higher-risk building may face restrictions, costs and delays on future fit-out works that it did not anticipate. Its business plan may also depend on a regulatory status that the landlord has not verified.

Funders and buyers

For lenders and investors, regulatory status belongs in due diligence. The questions are whether the scheme was built on the basis that it is a hotel, what evidence supports that position, and whether the lease terms and operating model protect it. A buyer relying on the exclusion inherits the consequences if it proves unsound, and a lender’s security may be worth considerably less if the building needs registration it never had.

A direction of travel

In Wales, the Building (Amendment) (Wales) Regulations 2025 extended the combustible materials restrictions for external walls to hotels, hostels and boarding houses from 20 December 2025. That change concerns construction materials rather than the higher-risk building approval regime, and it applies in Wales rather than England. It does, however, suggest that regulators are becoming less willing to treat hotels as inherently lower risk.

In England, the hotel exclusion rests on assumptions about how hotels operate. The growth of hybrid models puts those assumptions under strain, and it would be unwise to assume the exclusion will remain in its current form indefinitely.

Getting the answer right early

For a new aparthotel scheme, the question of regulatory status is best settled at the design stage, with a clear operating model and evidence to support it. For existing assets, landlords and funders can review whether the building’s current use still matches the basis on which it was built and let.

The hotel exclusion remains valuable, but it is not a label that can be applied by branding alone. It depends on how a building is designed and run, and that makes it a question for careful advice rather than assumption.