What do you think about council housing and people who live there?

[Borntolurk]

Genuinely curious about this. We finally received a council tenancy four years ago, after privately renting for upwards of 11 years. We are very grateful that we have the house we do, and treat it well. The security felt and ability to feel like we have an actual home (as opposed to house sitting), is immense.

However, I’ve had people I know suddenly become less interested in being friends, when they found out that our property was rented from the council. Others let slip accidentally/without realising what they were saying, that we should accept whatever happened to our house (shoddy contractor’s work for example) as it was ‘free’. Sigh.

So I guess I’ve been wondering whether this is the general consensus these days, and why do folk feel this way? Experience? Lack of other affordable housing? I can understand that!

Thanks for your thoughts.

I've never been to London but that sounds lovely! Would love to see your view

This isn't true. Surely you've seen the threads by people pondering whether to buy a new build on a street shared with social housing new builds! The stereotypical nonsense spouted about social housing tenants on them threads is truly shocking.

I actually live in a social housing new build myself and I was both angry and hurt by the vile comments.

The other side of the coin is a card through the door saying they're coming tomorrow to do something at some mad gap of time.

Apparently SH people don't work or some junk like that.

My social housing house is a new build semi with a nice driveway, lovely big garden with a shed, downstairs bathroom, very fancy kitchen and the master bedroom is so big it has two full size windows.
The privately owned detached house next door was bought for £639,000 and the house directly behind me is worth £2mil. Yet we're social housing! We all look after our homes nicely and we all get along great, it's a lovely street. Whereas a couple of the neighbours further up the street, will only speak to the neighbours in the privately owned homes!!

The worst people on my estate are actually those who've bought (and not through RTB bc they move in from having bought)

They've blatantly bought for the postcode (postcode alone will add another 200,000 compared to similar properties just 20 mins down the road)

Rather than join in the community- you've got dude who won't pick up his dogs mess and woman who will make noise complaints over children playing in the daytime

Nobody cares that they bought, we just think it's stupid to buy somewhere you clearly care less about contributing to and do nothing but complain- and weirder to stay when you could buy a house 20 mins down the road for the same price freehold

@gamerchick

This also happens with non SH people. Trades people can be terrible.

Oh, and the most antisocial behaving people I have come across have been owners. All entitled, think they run the street and their DC poorly behaved.
Trashing neighbours cars, firing airgun at council housing windows. Bullying of tenants children.

I don't think people should have to leave their homes if the earn a lot. Surely we want mixed communities in council estates not ghettos of disadvantage. In an ideal world, council housing should be plentiful, so it's the first choice for renters, not last resort for the desperate. As a society, we could choose to build more social housing, instead, we've chosen to leave families and individuals sleeping in cars and homeless hotels.

There is only the right to one succession of tenancy, so a joint to sole (on death) would become that right so no longer able to be succeeded by someone else. There are various differences in rules but for example a child (as in 'of a parent') who had been a household member for longer than a defined period could succeed the tenancy if they had been no previous succession. It is the tenancy though, not necessarily the property.

Get a grip FFS. I'm stating the rules, not providing a personal opinion or moral judgement.

I never said anyone was forced into having children - What a bizarre comment. I also never said being disabled was a choice. If elderly people need a 24hr carer I believe they generally go into a care home. Or else they're funding the 24hr care themselves and not one of those surviving on benefits, so will also be funding whatever property they need to live in.

They might need a 2nd bedroom for equipment. It does not have to be a for a carer. My grandparents were always placed in 2 bed places so there was room for my grandad's medical stuff. My gran was his carer, so no need for a home.

Disability is not a choice despite what those who work for HAs think!!!!

Everyone who works for a HA thinks this do they? And you know this for a fact?

It is also possible to get (well apply for at least) a Discretionary Housing Payment.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/claiming-discretionary-housing-payments/claiming-discretionary-housing-payments

Ive seen tenants get told to get rid of their mobility scooter because its deemed to be a fire hazard.
I have yet to see tenants who own those ridiculous electric scooters get told the same

On the topic of council estates, there aren't estates anymore are there? Not new ones. I thought all social housing now had to be integrated into builds not set apart on their own estate which is a good thing.

I will be brutally honest but read to the end before you all pile on me. Growing up as a child/young person (in the 90s) I did very much hold pretty stereotypical views about people who lived on council estates. Not all council house occupants, because my grandmother had a lifetime tenancy one not on an estate and she was nice.

But in my town it was very much half and half. Not many people private rented, you either lived in an owned house on the nice side of town and went to the nice school with the nice children or you lived on the rough side of town, and went to the rough school with the rough children.

Then everyone combined at secondary which was smack bang between the two and the only school in town. The divide was clear. To be fair, the children who went to school with from the council estate WERE rougher than me and my friends from the other school. We were scared of a lot of them. They swore, they scrapped, they smoked, they spat at us, they got into trouble, they always had weed. I'm not saying for a moment that I was a perfectly behaved child however I didn't do those things. Nor was I rich, or posh or whatever. I came from a single parent family and we never had any spare cash. We did have a (small) nice home in a quiet place that Mum owned though.

So yeah, growing up, council estate to me = rough and absolutely the stereotype of sofas in the garden, feral kids belting about at all hours etc etc etc.

However twenty/twenty five odd years later I feel very differently. Incidentally I'm a home owner but my friendships are very varied between owned/private rented/social housing - even living back with parents in one case! Times have changed and also I have enough adult perspective to realise that not everyone who lived in that area would've been like that in fact probably most weren't.

Also these days it is not easy to get social housing. It's not like the years gone by. I couldn't care less where people live as long as they're nice. I work with a lot of families who have significant input with health and social care services due to disabilities who live in social housing. They are utterly deserving of the help they receive and it would be criminal for them not be housed securely and at a reasonable cost that is manageable for them. They still struggle.

I do agree with others though that social housing should be a stop gap - and a long term one if needed- to get on your feet. If it were in plentiful supply possibly not, but it isn't. It's not right that you have people stuck in B+Bs or in inappropriate HMOs or waiting on a list for years and years when you have someone down the road who has had their house fifteen years at a low rent rate, can well afford to move on now but doesn't. You can argue that it's not fair for people in social housing not to feel secure but private renters can be evicted. Not fair. Home owners can lose jobs/health through no fault of their own and be repossessed. Also not fair. No one is truly secure in their property unless they're mortgage free.

So to answer your question OP, I wouldn't think anything, now. If you are nice I'd be your friend and I wouldn't give a shit where you lived and how much you pay.

It's not entitlement, it's the rules. The tenancy agreement contains rules for landlords as well as for tenants. Leaving people with no heating or hot water for any length of time in cold weather will be against the rules. That'll be why they're complaining, I expect the landlord would be quick enough to complain if the tenant was breaking them. There's similar rules for private tenants too, but they won't necessarily know about that as their tenancies don't tend to state the landlords responsibilities. Home owners don't have any rules and are in charge of their own situation

Mobility scooters are a fire hazard, either due to the risk of catching fire or blocking a safe exit in the event of a fire.

This is a fairly sobering watch at how quickly a fire can take hold.

Dorset Fire Service that produced the video www.dwfire.org.uk/safer-housing/mobility-scooters/

This thread isn't really about this though, or covid, or the compliance contractor so I will leave it there.

Agreed, especially the really lovely new council houses near me.

@WhiteFire DH stores his in a scooter shed outside This was after the HA threatened to remove it and destroy it at Christmas 2017

Why arent electric scooters treated the same way,

www.itv.com/news/2022-08-19/concern-over-huge-rise-in-fires-caused-by-e-bike-and-e-scooter-batteries

I do agree with others though that social housing should be a stop gap - and a long term one if needed- to get on your feet. If it were in plentiful supply possibly not, but it isn't.
Well build or buy more social housing. The only reason social housing isn't plentiful is because we've chosen for it not to be. Why shouldn't people have secure affordable homes and councils then have income streams from the rent.

When I replied to the other poster, the post the ranting one quoted, they weren't asking about disabled elderly people just elderly people in general. I imagine if someone is assessed as needing a two bed property due to disability (as for any other reason) they'll get the appropriate amount of housing benefit for it. I've never heard of an elderly person living in a one bed property being told that it'll be arranged for them to move into a two bed property so they can have a 24hr carer, I imagine in most cases it couldn't be arranged quickly enough (since the need wouldn't be approved in advance of it occurring) and the person would be said to be in unsuitable accommodation currently and moved to a care home so they could be appropriately cared for, in the majority of cases

Social housing contractors have nothing to do with a thread about social housing......er ok. Have you mentioned that to the actual contractor who posted upthread and that her profession has nothing to do with it or are you just saving that for us tenants

Because those people can afford to support themselves elsewhere, whilst others who can't languish for years on waiting lists, in B+Bs etc etc!

I agree there should be more built absolutely.

I'm a homeowner and a landlord, it's a nightmare trying to get a tradesperson for emergency repairs, both in my own home and tenants homes. I try my best. My tenants know this and in fairness to them don't moan if it takes a while, at least not to me. Anyway, they have a right to complain about things taking time to be fixed, I complain myself about being unable to find someone, both for my own house and theirs.

I'm not going to be the one to derail this thread, so I'll step away.