To think if all your children have grown up and left you should give up your 5 bed council house?

[dilemma456]

The housing list are so long and especially for bigger properties.

I met someone who lives by herself in a 5 bed council house last night. Her children have all moved out. There are people who really need that house crammed into much smaller properties.

AIBU to think that if you're massively under occupying social housing you should be under an obligation to move out into something smaller and that the council should offer you support and encouragement to do so?

Um caring society.... i don't think anyone out there would disagree that i am in real desperate need of rehousing.. can i get it? Can i buggery!

But my mum and dad paid tax all their lives they were always working poor..unfortunately my dad died just before he retired so no pension for him ..they never had it easy either.I'm glad she has a comfortable life now she bloody deserves it

I get what your saying usual but can't you see that if someone like your Mum downsized to a property she could be equally happy in, then another tax paying, hard working family who are in real need could live there and then 2 lots of people could be happily housed rather than just 1?

Everyone deserves a safe, happy home but because some people are under occupying some other people are really suffering.

there was a guarantee 'from cradle to the grave' so maybe that doesn't exist now but people did expect it as they were promised it.

and i expect alot of older people are disillusioned with the youth of today, including parents who keep on having kids to get housing.

and of course lots don't do that but lots do!

I can totally understand why people get so stressed over this but as someone with two children desperately trying to get a mortgage right now and unable to as it has to be a thirty GRAND deposit (fifteen - twenty percent of average two bed house price in our area) I think there are some very unrealistic opinions on this thread. There arent many families who could go into extortionate private renting (about 1000 - 1100 for a two bed in my area) plus pay childcare(five pound per hour for EACH child) , council tax (150 for a two bed in my area) electric, gas, clothing food, etc etc and still save for a deposit to buy their own house.

My understanding is the average salary in my area is 22-25000, and in most families I know both people work, one part time and dont get a great deal of tax credit so there is very little change left.

I think housing should be allocated to families and I DO think the elderly should move but I dont think bringing private rules and costs to social housing is right - I just think it should be managed better and made more available to more people in a fairer way. Older people took huge advantage of the buy to let mortgage and I think that people with second homes that they use once or twice a year should be FORCED to let it out for at least three quarters of the year to single people to free up at least some of the social shortage.

how about lobbying for more affordable housing rather than turfing out pensioners

exactly nikkershaw - see my other post.

But then you get the people who rightly dont want to see greenbelt land concreted over when there is so much housing available, just badly mismanaged.

I don't think pensioners should be turned out actually - I said that further down the thread. But I do think that once your children have left home, then you should be rehoused into smaller housing. That should give you a few years to build a life for yourself in a new place.

And people in privately owned homes do that - move out when they retire to something smaller. I think everyone should do it.

The situation is what it is and the fact is that if single people were not allowed to stay in huge properties, there would be a lot fewer families living in totally inadequate housing. And yes, it cuts both ways in a caring society as expat says. Not 'I'm old, I've paid my dues so fuck the next generation'.

It is as an awful lot of things in this world some runining it for everyone else.

You get some that cheat the system they,

Pretend to split with thier partner so they get a second home then promptley let thier teenagers have it.

Accept a coucil house then only live thier 3 months of the year.

Live in COucil houses when they can afford not to.

Have more children to get a bigger house.

I could go on but i know at least 1 person that does each of those things.

They take the piss and ruin it for people like me who play fair and then suffer for it.

It happens with loads of things in this world and its always the genuine, decent people that become worse off.

Not turf people out as do understand people invest a lot of time and care in their propertys and means you do get a good mix of people on housing estates

but make it clear that someone moving In ie family member do not automatically get right of succesion

who then go on to buy it very cheaply and sell it of or a adult grandchild then gets the house as they moved in to help well to inherit

and yes I do understand how hard it is in propery to small I gave mind up as their was nothing available for us they had no 4 beds left at all

'how about lobbying for more affordable housing rather than turfing out pensioners'

Why assume everyone who thinks people should be moved on from social housing that's now too large for their needs isn't?

And all this 'young people today' is getting really tiresome, considering many people on this board are in their 30s and 40s.

The fact that you think people who turn out children get a bigger house from the council shows how out of step you are with reality.

No one was every promised anything cradle to grave. If they believed that, that's their folly.

Everyone who works pays into the system. It's not a pay in-get out system.

People of my generation (late 30s/early 40s) can expect to work till they drop, much less being able to hang around in a too big council house.

Hahaahaahaaa.

I just don't think there should be any, 'One rule for them, another for you because you're 'young', a private renter, etc.'

That's bullshit.

and doesnt it make you resentful as hell. I am working stupid hours to find the money for a deposit on a house so we can actually fit our kids in to the house and BUGGER ME I feel annoyed that there are so few homes available for families like hours that we can actually AFFORD or are considered ENTITLED to. Knowing that two fifty year olds with two jobs and grown up children are hogging a three bed house from a family struggling makes me mad as hell - make them move before they get too old, be glad they had the opportunity of somewhere for their kids growing up and give that same chance to someone else.

I think there is a problem with people in general living in properties that are bigger than they need. This is an obvious ethical problem when England is one of the most densely populated regions in the world and housing stock is finite.

People should be financially penalised for occupying houses larger than they require. That should include, for example, a family with two children living in a 4 bedroom house. Whether or not the house is privately owned (usually by a bank for most of the occupation period, rather than the actual occupier) or by the council is irrelevant in terms of the impact on overcrowding across England.

A system where people were penalised for under occupying would flatten out house prices so that family sized houses were more affordable for actual families.

i'm just judging on the area i know and the people i know who have played the system. of course you're all perfect citizens on here who would never do that.

ok where's your lobbying?

The government has said that it will review council housing tenancy arrangement but existing tenants will still keep their secure tenancies so it will take years and years, even if it is changed, to filter through and have any impact on the demand for housing.

Personally I don't think you should have a set tenancy for life but the guarantee of a home which is reviewed periodically and rents set accordingly to income in line with market rates. That way people who couldn't afford it would pay less and those who were earning considerably more than when they were given the tenancy would pay more. Or you should be charged extra for under occupancy.

I'm on a first-name basis with my MP, nikker, rather than just reading the Daily Mail and carping on about 'young people today'.

haha! yeah whatever you assume

Yes pretty it does make me resentful.

I'm sitting here in a tiny upstairs flat, i have 1 child who has a severe respiratory condition and some days cant get down the stairs, he needs a garden for physio but our 'garden' in right down the street, DP is having to climb into the loft to get fridges down for his meds.
Then there is me, i have severe Hyper mobility Syndrome, about 4 out of 7 days i can't leave this fucking flat because i can't physically walk.
I can't get down to put washing on the line but can't use airers as DS's chest wont tolerate wet clothes indoors, i have to use a tumble dryer it costs the earth.
I can't get down to the bins so i often have stinking bin bags outside my front door.
I have lost count of the times i have fallen down the concrete steps in and out my flat and really hurt myself.

I also have a 3yr old, so imagine on a day i can walk although in pain, i have to get up or down stairs with a toddler and a really ill child, with any shopping or baggage i may have. Combine this with a total lack of parking because of selfish cunts next door and that is my life.

Sorry for the rant but im sick of it.

You assumed anyone who feels people should be moved on from occupying homes that are now too large for them doesn't lobby for more socialised housing being built.

Council housing wasn't meant to be for people who couldn't afford other options. It has become that way because of a huge increase in people entitled to priority on the housing list because of the housing market being overpriced/increase in single adult households/people having children they can't afford to support/increase in care in the community/increase in drug use or whatever other social ill depending on your individual political persuasion.

The idea that someone is more entitled to council housing because they are poorer is what annoys people who are starting out in life, but earn say, £25,000 between them and would like to start a family. Those people should have equal rights to long term, secure council housing.

To ensure that impoverished people do not end up homeless, the government should expand its support of the Crisis bond and support scheme for homeless people to move into private tenancies and make it illegal to discriminate against tenants on housing benefit. But there is no reason why being poorer should give someone more right to the security of council housing than a family on a low to average income has.

Being threatened with homelessness should mean that you are entitled to huge support in being found some sort of tenancy, but it does not follow that you are more entitled to a better standard of tenancy agreement than someone else.

'Those people should have equal rights to long term, secure council housing.'

What should happen is that short-assured tenancies should no longer be mainstream and caps should be put on teh amount of rent a landlord can charge depending on size and area. If that landlord then cannot afford to be a BTL landlord, too bad.

so what does your mp say then?

TitsalinaBumSquash I feel so sad for you - are you getting any support at ALL. What a bloody mare and you are entitled to feel angry.

Milly I disagree to a certain extent in that I know for a fact that that isnt how the priority system works. It SHOULD be aimed at those people but isnt. Families with ANY income, or couples looking to become families are the ones who wait ten years for a tiny flat.

Yes, I agree expat. If BTL tenancy agreements were more in line with social housing agreements, there wouldn't be all of this fighting for council housing. We need to try and find ways of getting everyone better housing, not have people fighting between themselves.