Housing benefit & private renting

[ivykaty44]

www.theguardian.com/society/2018/aug/29/low-income-tenants-face-heat-eat-or-pay-rent-choices-study

The combination of private LandLords and housing benefits not keeping up with sky high rents is going to put more and more people on the streets

In my area a council property 3 bedroom is £130 per week rental or s two bed house £87 per week

Private rents are rarely under £700 per week for s two bed house

There just aren’t enough social houses to rent and private ll charge massive rents, you can rarely rent unless two of you or earnings over £25k

What are people to do?

£700 pw for a 2 bed house? Just been on rightmove and there's a 2 bed house in Kensington for £600 pw. You sure that's right?

2 bed flat in my area is around £800. It’s ridiculous

Are you on the list for a council house? That's the first thing i'd do. Whats your current housing situation?

I rent a 2 bed flat for £425 a month. I moved in 4 years ago and I have great landlords that refuse to raise my rent even though the average for a 2 bed property in my area has gone up to around £500pm now.

Local housing allowance for my area is £435pm for a 2 bed property. There is a lady in my area whose landlord sold up and she is now living in a hostel with her child as she can't find a landlord that will accept housing benefit and the council have basically said there just aren't any properties.

The housing crisis is a real awful thing.

I think the poster means £700 a month? By the way, if someone is in a private rent (in expensive areas) and they aren’t about to be evicted there is pretty much no point in going on a waiting list and some councils won’t even put you on their list as there is no point until you are actually classed as being in some sort of extreme situation. Private renting is a really big problem that will probably never be fixed.

many landlords cannot accept tenants on hb because mortgage and insurance wont allow it. that can only be changed by legislation on banks and insurers. No such legislation, no campaigns for it - too obvious for Shelter, maybe?

there are not enough council houses due to right to buy and no replacements. To build more we need to raise taxes. People do not vote for that, proved repeatedly.

To raise taxes (to be paid by those who would never benefit from social housing) in order to build more council houses which would then be bought out by council tenants at ridiculously low prices? No thanks.

That’s interesting Special, do you think there are no campaigns to get banks and insurance providers to change as it’s too big a fight?

Our council only has HAs and they are, frankly, as bad as private landlords.

There's no longer any security with tenancies. A friend who has agoraphobia and schizophrenia has just been moved to a different HA property 20 miles away from their GP, CMHT (who refuse to visit anyone with agoraphobia as they see it as encouraging the illness), and shops (there's nothing there aside from a couple of properties) with no public transport because their year was up (they didn't know it was for a year only, because they thought they could stay long term as they'd been bought up in council housing and secure tenancy) and they needed to prove need compared to others on the list which they couldn't do so were forced to move. They're distraught. They can't even watch tv/go online/use a mobile as there's no digital signal where they are. There was no option for private as she only had eight weeks to find somewhere else that would accept benefits and couldn't. Yes someone should have explained to her it had changed but no one did. No shelter or CAB here and I never realised this was how it worked - to be honest I'd assumed it was a get out clause for them if someone didn't pay their rent/was a problem tenant.

The "cost" is comparable with private here because the "goal" is for everyone to move to (what they call) more permanent private rentals not stay in HA. The rent is set at local housing allowance level (no separate housing benefit rate payable here anymore everyone's been moved and all new tenants get this rate only and yes they apply bedroom tax to the LHA rate as they get around it by calling it housing benefit despite it being exactly the same rate) but the service charges, which in private accommodation must be included in rent, rise every year making the two comparable if you include both essential costs.

The HAs also work as private landlords as well.

I'm constantly amazed on MN about this issue elsewhere because it makes no sense to me that it would vary so massively around the country. Even staying on the list here (no bidding) is hard work and impossible to work out where you stand as there are five or six different lists.

The only answer is for people to move to cheaper areas. Or a radical overhaul of the benefits system, and a mass change in how we view social safety nets.
Rents are being pushed ever higher and housing benefit is contributing to this. It's absolutely criminal that as a society we aren't willing to pay for social housing to be built but will happily pour money into the pockets of private landlords via housing benefit.

I think Shelter are looking at taking a test case for judicial review regarding landlords not accepting tenants who are entitled to HB. It was on the news last week. So looks like they are campaigning.

I live in rural Wales, supposedly very cheap to live. But tv/mobile etc very patchy here - many areas with nothing at all, literally the next street there's no mobile signal at all and no tv due to the layout of where I live.

There's a big issue at the moment that my local authority are advertising properties here in other areas when there are huge numbers on the list here because the properties are usually big (not always) but in the middle of nowhere. Literally middle of nowhere, increasingly parts of my county are turning into ghost villages as they're too expensive to buy or rent. No shops, no schools, no banks, no police, fire stations closing, ambulance stations closing, increasingly no GP services (you can be almost 20 miles from a GP in some parts of this county), hospital services are bare minimum. That's where these houses are. People come here and have a massive, understatement, culture shock. It's one thing to come here for a break to get away from it all but permanently is a shock so they leave and the cycle begins again. Our MP is campaigning for young people to stay here but can't get it into his head that there's nothing now to stay for. Everything is going.

Rents here are high. Not because of high rates of housing benefit, the rates are very low - the housing benefit rate here is calculated according to two counties, one of which is the poorest in Wales to keep the bill low and below any rents here (aside from HA but like I said that's literally rent not the extras they add on). The only way to pay on benefit is to be working cash in hand as well, or having a relative pay towards it, or take out a loan or credit card - all things I was told to do by the council when housing benefit ended and became local housing allowance.

Renting a room to your child or relative you're told to register them as lodgers and claim local housing allowance. Sound good? Its then used to keep the bill very low for those who need it. When last ar the council an elderly couple were being bullied (they clearly didn't want to do this as he could pay) into making their son a formal lodger because he could then claim the £20 a week for the rent - that £20 a week then goes down as being a realistic rent which of course it isn't!

When my landlord kicks me out I'll have nowhere to go - HA here expect guarantor earning 10 times the rent and Ive no one, God knows what private want. No spare money to pay to move elsewhere. No connections anywhere else. It's terrifying.

Bugger that was meant to be preview. Sorry if unhelpful I'll get it removed!

Just to clarify I couldn't get discretionary housing payments, they're strictly limited to three six month payments only.

I pay 675 for my 2 bed in North Essex. We had to offer double the deposit to get my landlord to agree as I was on HB.

The issue with housing benefit and landlords is that housing benefit is paid in arrears, and can stop if the claimant is being investigated.
Not every landlord is rolling in cash, my aunt for example is an accidental landlord after her daughter died and she rents out her flat as she can’t bring herself to sell it nor can she afford the mortgage without the income.

It is also incredibly hard to ger rid of HB tenants, which pits of landlords who may want to move back into the property. I work in property law and yes there are bad landlords but there are some fucking dire tenants too.

A lot of BTL mortgages also do not allow HB as a condition of the mortgage.

I think it’s easy to say ‘move to a cheaper area, problem solved’ but as highlighted in the last post, moving to cheaper areas often means less jobs, jobs paying lower wages so you are again stuck in the situation of needing housing help but with the extra hassle of living somewhere you don’t know, with no connections to the area, lack of public transport, often lack of internet/phone signal etc so you may be worse off than when you had a full time job in a city where although you were earning not too bad an amount, the rent was so high you needed help to cover housing costs and all the stress and rigmarole that goes with it. Catch 22 situation really.

Lastqueen, I imagine it’s hard to ‘get rid of’ such tenants because there is such little housing choice out there for them. If laws changed then it would be much less of a problem would it not?

lastqueen it is also a fact that even in this day and age payments get delayed. I've had it with ESA/DLA/PIP payments as well over the years. Neither the council nor the dwp get that people live from payment to payment and have bills etc to pay, and always I get sarcastic comments about needing to prepare for late money so just save. It's a chain of disasters really. Late payment to me has never meant late payment to landlord, except when in hospital (I was still charged £40 late fee), but that's not the point. Not every prioritises housing like I do or has had my experiences.

I prioritise my rent over everything. I know others don't. I try to care for the property, though not to good enough standard anymore due to illness but I try. I let the landlord know if there's an issue etc. Yet I get a lot of shit from them. They go mad at me if I refer to it as my flat or my home or any kind of residence and insist they're doing me a favour. Fact is without them I'd be on the street again and they and I know it.

hmm yes that was what my essay was getting at! Council taxi also very expensive here too.

My morgage will not allow tenants to be on housing benefits. So it isn't landlords refusing, companies will not permit it and therefore the anti landlord rants are a bit unfair tbh.
Selling of council houses when there is a need seems wrong to me as does restrictions on mortgages against Hb for buy to let

It was an informative and interesting post becca and I hope you don’t get it removed.

It’s cost my daughter nearly £3000 to move into a private rented house. I honestly don’t know how people afford to move.

Why is the Governments problem house that people aren't within walking distance of shop etc, or with internet access.

People also need to take some responsibility too. Yes it may mean the only place you can afford to live means the GP is 20 miles away but that's how it is in some parts of the country.

There are bad landlords and bad tenants. Tenants need safe, secure housing but landlords need to be able to get rid of problem tenants more easily.

I won't if it helps. I ramble hugely in RL so tend to always preview and edit before posting!

I'm not anti landlord to be clear, mine is a shit and has been cautioned by the police for being abusive towards me in the street - by no means do I think all do that!

My area do still sell off properties but the criteria for doing so is as complex as the housing lists. Despite going on the housing website I'm no clearer why they need six!

Shelter have been campaigning and legally challenging housing benefit and private renting issues for several years. But it's quite legally complex.

As for lack of social housing being built, that's a Thatcher legacy, not sure why stopping councils building housing was introduced though.

Building more social housing would be beneficial to the country not just in providing more housing but in providing jobs and stimulating the economy but tories tend to be short sightedly protectionist in their policies.

Lastqueenofscotland - sorry but I think anyone who can't properly afford to bear the costs of being a landlord has no right to be one. Accidental landlords are especially bad for this as they rarely have the funds to cover emergency repairs and also tend to not get proper landlord insurance (claiming they can't afford it - I'd like it to be law that they have correct landlord insurance and £X saved for emergencies). The roof over people's heads shouldn't be subject to inexperienced, ill informed and reluctant amateurs playing at business. Seen it on here several times people thinking renting a property out as easy quick way to make money, cos hey the going rate for rent is way higher than the mortgage payment, without knowing anything about safety regulations and inspections, required standards of maintaining the property, tenants rights etc. As someone who works in property law I'd expect you to know that.