Posted at 12:30 pm, May 27, 2015 in Property

Feeling a bit strapped for cash before payday? Thanks to a change in the law, Londoners can now rent their spare rooms on a short-term basis and basically become Airbnb millionaires. Or at least earn a nice wad of cash. Up until now, Londoners have been banned from renting out a spare room for less than three months unless they had planning permission. But the government has just axed the 1973 Greater London Council Act, making it easier for you to rent your spare room on a short-term basis on sites like Airbnb and OneFineStay for up to three months a year. Admittedly, people were probably bending the rules a bit before and doing it anyway, but if caught out they would have previously faced whopping fines of up to £20,000, which kind of defeats the whole point. The change in law means you could seriously benefit from all the tourists looking for somewhere to stay in London – just whack a couple of candles in your spare room, stock up on cornflakes and call it a continental breakfast and you ll be raking it in.

How much could you actually earn by getting in the Airbnb game? These are the average nightly prices for five boroughs in London: