Lottery winner keeping her council house.

[NickyNora]

A lady i know recently won over a million pounds on the lottery. She has purchased 2 properties & put them in family members names.

She intends to keep her council house.
She didn't buy it as even with the discount, it woukd use up a large proportion of her win.

Is this even legal?

AIBU to think she's being greedy & should terminate her council tenancy & give back the council house?

I think she should give up the tenancy but legally if it’s a secure tenancy and she is paying rent, I don’t think the council can force her to do so.

Yes I think council houses should be for those with no other options.

Not sure if it’s legal. I don’t think it is here (Australia), as they take assets and bank balances into account.

I'm presuming its a Secure Tenancy as shes been there years.

She should be able to keep it. I’m sure she’ll be paying full council rent. They’re fair rent, not discounted. If we make council estates the preserve of the very poor they become slums.

One of the TFL union leaders on his huge salary boasted of his council house so although it's not moral it is legal.

Yeah as far as I’m aware there’s nothing in the tenancy agreement to cover big wins/inheritance etc. Obviously it would be different if she tries to claim housing benefit at some stage. That would be refused. But otherwise it likely is perfectly legal. Morally I totally agree with you and she should have returned it to the council.

It's legal yeah but most people would buy a nice property

Depends. Some areas of the country have plenty of council houses.

Modern day equivalent of pitchforks and torches.

@Poloshot its a very nice house.

Personally, it feels quite wrong but each to their own.

I'm sure it is but it won't be as nice a property as she'd be able to afford as a lottery winner

Well, statistically speaking, lottery winners who have very little money before their win are usually back to their pre-win financial status within 3-5 years, or worse off. So it's probably sensible not to give up her council home if it's secure.

If she’s been there a long time she’s probably paid for it several times over. It’s her home and she should stay there (and is allowed legally to stay there).

Depending on where she lives, a million pounds may not stretch that far in practice.

well if it's her home and she has been there for years, paying rent for it, I don't see the problem. In another relatively few years she will be dead, then someone else can have it. That is how it has always worked.

Up to her,maybe she doesn’t want to uproot to a new area
And realistically many lotto winners fritter the winnings away she might need the house...

If we make council estates the preserve of the very poor they become slums.

I BEG your pardon!?

People with low incomes aren't necessarily scruffs!

AFAIK no council carries out inspections of finances after a tenancy's started. They may decline housing on the basis of choices made, as the "blown inheritance" case this week showed, but not once they're in place

Personally I wish it was otherwise, but that's not really the point

And realistically many lotto winners fritter the winnings away she might need the house..

She has another two, Lipstick

She's a greedy cow, but being a greedy cow isn't an arrestle offence, more's the pity . . .

She is, however, depriving someone else of a home. Council houses were built to provide people on low incomes who could not otherwise afford a house, with a decent place to live.

We’ll surely she should be able to buy the property, so she doesn’t have to move but the council have some funds to reinvest into new build properties.

Council housing wasn't intended for those with no other options. IT was meant for anyone who needed it.

Don't people care about community any more? Why shouldn't this woman get to stay in her community? Perhaps her community are enriched by her being there (I don't mean financially, I mean as a friend and neighbour).

If she's paying her rent, then she has every right to be there.

This is a non-issue.

The real issue is how successive governments have deliberately (Thatcher) or neglectfully let the stock of council housing get so low that people think it should only be for the most desperately in need, at a time when we have rising house prices. homelessness and a housing crisis.

People aren't given council houses, you know. They rent them at a reasonable rate, not one kept artificially high by housing being treated as a commodity.

A properly run modern council housing scheme would bring in money for the tax payer.

We'd save millions currently being syphoned out of our taxes to go to private landlords in rent for a start, and a well managed scheme would save the tax payer money in myriad ways, as well as improving the quality of life for millions, and could even turn a surplus, managed well.

But they don't want to as it doesn't fit their ideology of selling everything off for profit.

That's a fucking scandal. This country is being asset stripped. There's not so much left now, so they're asset stripping us.

Sorry for the rant, but FFS people, this kind of social shaming is Daily Mail comments stuff.

People with low incomes aren't necessarily scruffs!

It's a fair point. If we make council housing only for the very poor (i.e. those in desperate need, with no job, complex problems etc) and move people out once they are back on their feet, then they will end up slums.

You can't build a strong community if it's only made up of transient people in dire straits, and anyone with prospects is shipped out.

I don't care how much someone who lives in a council property earns / has in the bank.

However, at least with my council - you can not keep your council home (however long you have been in it) of you then own another property.

I have paid in rent over 20 years exactly what my HA house would be worth on the open market. I do not, however, have any incentive scheme to move out and will never be offered the opportunity to buy it - discount or otherwise.

During those years we have had enough small inheritance for a deposit on a house too small for the four of us, but no chance of getting a mortgage anyway.

The rent is still 1/3 of our household income now the DC (2) are renting their own places.

It's my prerogative to stay as long as I can earn enough to cover it before facing old age on the breadline with nothing to show for it.

Some people get free houses and don't know what rent or mortgage payments mean; some, who bought their council houses, think Thatcher was their fairy godmother; others just pay their rent and are grateful to have a place to call home without 'Alright Jack' judging. A few, like me, have been ripped blind by step children inheriting the family home.

Death, illness, divorce, abuse means many people don't have the choice that an ideal life allows.

It sounds like the 'millionaire' has looked after her family. Houses are not just a commodity - they're homes and the structure of a community and she's chosen to stay with her's. She'll be paying the rent - that's the deal.