We can’t house our friends belongings anymore

Regardless of your opinion on the rights and wrongs of their situation, you have stored their stuff for over a year and can no longer do it. Stick to that when you talk to them. I would give them a deadline of about a month to move it. Personally I wouldn't go with asking them to take only some of it, as that runs the risk of it multiplying again when they ask you to squeeze a bit more in. You have been very generous but it has a limit.

Reading this update they definitely shouldn’t have turned down the offer. That was ridiculously stupid of them.

They’d have at least had a place to call home.

YANBU

How can it be too small compared to a hotel room!? Berks.

I think you have been more than patient, time to get rid.

Well they couldn't have been that desperate to turn a house down 🤷‍♀️ so they must have realised that they'd have to do the whole housing thing on their own including storage for their belongings?

Its being a cheeky fucker trying to pick and choose what they have, expecting youll facilitate this, instead of being grateful for anything given. They've had a year. Had their belongings stored, been offered a house, they're now causing their situation

its a shame in hindsight, but they could have taken the 3 bed and then after a while tried to do an exchange

Do you know why they turned down the offer from the council OP? If they have children this seems a rather irresponsible decision (unless the offer of accommodation was miles from their work or children's schools).

YANBU. They were offered a property and they turned it down. You need to be firm with them and tell them it all needs to go

I think this is fair- they need to sort (and even sell) some items so that it goes into one space; and then give them a timescale; say that you would like at least the house cleared out for Christmas but perhaps a few more months for the garage. You've saved them loads of money and this gives them time to search for other arrangements for storage.

Do they really need all this stuff? If they haven’t used it for a year, perhaps they don’t need most of it. Perhaps they could reduce it by half? Yes they should have taken what was offered. You would be quite justified in telling them that you can no longer store it.

Very difficult situation for you. Your friends may have made a real mistake in not accepting the offer of accommodation. Just to point out though that they won’t have been housed temporarily for free they will have been required to pay rent.

Storage unit about £200 a month for quite a big space it's affordable

We had a ten month period in between houses as ours was delayed during the build. We rented a container which held the entire contents of our house with room to spare for less than £100pm.

Tell them to come collect it and rent a storage unit.

They've likely been kicked off the council list for making themselves voluntarily homeless by turning down what they were offered, if they've had to leave the temporary accommodation that'll be because the council no longer has a duty to help them.

They couldn't afford private rent before and they can't afford it now. This situation isn't going to fix itself and they aren't going to magic up somewhere to put their stuff. It's ultimatum time. They come and take it by the weekend or you're taking the whole lot to the dump.

If you're feeling generous, let them keep the stuff in the garage as per the original agreement and they remove the rest. But do so knowing you'll have it there forever basically and by the time they come to remove it (if they ever do) it'll be all mouldy and unusable and they'll leave anything they don't want behind for you to dispose of because they're piss taking twats.

The people on the lower rungs of the council list have realistically got zero chance of ever being permanently housed by them. Especially if they're being picky! Private landlords are never ever going to choose these people over people who are better able to afford the rent and also have a landlords reference. They're being totally unrealistic about their housing options. They need to be looking at 2 bedroom flats. There's no way they can afford to stay in a hotel long term so any minute now the shit is about to hit the fan. Issue the ultimatum whilst you still can, while you know where they are, while their phones haven't been cut off and while they can't drop "but I'm sleeping on the streets and don't need this hassle, you're so mean" on you.

They are going to have to lower their standards.
How can someone who has been storing their belongings for over a year have no compassion! Sometimes people need tough love.
I would check price of self storage and give them a time limit and stick to it. I would rather lose them as friends than be a mug.

They must be stupid to turn down 3 bedroom accommodation. Rentals are really hard to find. Last 3 bedroom with a garden I advertised I got 26 people applying to EA in 48 hours before they took advantage down. Honestly almost all people who applied would have been suitable to rent it. Tell them you thought it was a temporary storage. You need space back for storing Xmas gifts so they must move it. I'd say by Oct half term.

Just tell them OP, they need to come and sort stuff and fit it in the garage space (if that’s the compromise you are comfortable with) or you tell them they need to put it in storage by XYZ

Do some research on local self storage places and offer to help them move the stuff.

More than a year is taking advantage.

Can you ask them to sort through/rearrange their things, so they take up less space? Maybe they can get rid of some things?

What’s the reason they haven’t found a private rental in a year??

Hi friend. How are things?
We are going to have a little sort out in a couple of weeks to make space for Xmas things. Would it be possible to look at putting the things of yours from our house into storage to give us the space to do that?

If you are busy I can help with finding somewhere suitable and helping to move the stuff across; just let me know.

Not at all unreasonable. I’ve been in a similar situation to your friends and was lucky I had someone to store mine and my kids stuff for us. But the deal was I had to go through it in the time it was being stored and get rid of things we didn’t really need or want. I was ruthless. I had to be because I didn’t know how long we’d be in refuge for. Have your friends ever even had a proper sort out so it’s at least all in one place, like the garage?

You’ve actually saved them a fair whack of money by storing at your house for an entire year already so there’s no reason they can’t now move to a storage locker. Might give them the kick up the arse they need to at least have a clear out.

I'd tell them after a year you can't do it any more.

Hopefully they make arrangments to come and pick it up - suggest a time line.

If not I'd get a case from a charity shop pack up their stuff in your bedroom and use their current hotel address and use a shipping service to send it to them. It will make point you are serious and get the daily irritant out the way and hopefully spur them into action.

A year is a piss take. That's plenty of time to have found somewhere sensible to store their stuff.

Give them a deadline.