To think it's disgusting the amount of landlords who won't accept DSS?

[7hup]

My friend is 36 and just been kicked out by her boyfriend because she had a mental breakdown and multiple suicide attempts .

She's just been released from hospital and has been given a B&B room as temporary accommodation.

She has to claim universal credit as she is in no fit state to work.

Council said if she can find private housing they will cover her first month's rent/deposit/fees.

No where takes housing benefit.

It's unfair.

There's no council accommodation and no private landlords will accept it.

She's 36. No children. No pets. Doesn't drink. Doesn't smoke. Is quiet and polite. Keeps to herself. Clean and tidy. She just needs a home :(

Its working people too. My Dsis has a kid and can't move out of my mums because she works only 16 hours because of her son so would receive housing benefit. So she can't move either.

Even on Spareroom. Co. UK in our area there are 674 rooms.

ONE takes DSS. And is dou le the price of similar rooms

It's so unfair :(

*lalalyra how does one find landlords outside of a LA scenario?

Charities like Shelter may be able to help her find suitable accommodation, but in her current circumstances with having no children etc I see nothing wrong with a roof over her head in a B&B

That is a shit attitude I have to say.

Do you honestly think it's perfectly ok for an adult to have to live in a B&B for several years? With no cooking facilities or means to do laundry?

We are a rich country, this should not be an acceptable standard. ALL people should be able to have a safe and reasonably adequate home with facilities to live normally - cook food, wash clothes.

That's leaving out the uncertainty of the constant churn of strangers through this B&B. That does not meet an appropriate standard of accommodation for a woman with mental health problems such as the OP's friend.

To put the other side over - I pretty much only accept benefit tenants for the last 10 years or so. All long term claimants waiting on social housing with specific disabilities or long term caring responsibilities.

It was a much less riskier option after chancing it again with the "hard working professional" guy who didn't pay his rent because he chose not too and didn't give me the back up of being able to approach the council for direct payments if need be.

However, I can totally understand why the current changes to benefits make people less likely to rent to people on them. My last tenant ended up with a nightmare time because her son was found fit to work. That affected him, her carers, their housing benefit etc and took months to sort. So even long term benefit claimants who should be safe because their circumstances are not likely to change are a risk now becuase of the wanky system we have.

Plabom I think it's absolutely fair to want a good history. It's the rigidity I find difficult. Later on we tried to get a different property but DH was on zero hours, by this time I had a stable job. My father who earns around 60k per year and has savings offered to guarantor us yet we were still rejected due to DHs job.

Luckily we've got a decent property now and an understanding landlord, but I'm always nervous that if he decides to sell we could struggle

Choosing to work part time and then moaning when you can't get a rental on your income without state help can easily be corrected by some lifestyle changes if they really want their own home.

Not true if you are a single person on minimum wage for example. At £9 an hour or thereabouts.

Drookit A decent housing officer will know a few. Then rightmove or gumtree or local paper. Look for people advertising as individuals. Also ask around - people often know someone who lets their place out, or have a LL themselves that they can ask.

Choosing to work part time and then moaning when you can't get a rental on your income without state help can easily be corrected by some lifestyle changes if they really want their own home.

I can't work full time due to medical reasons. They're invisible so to look at you would have no idea. Don't judge people working part time.

In an ideal world, landlords wouldn't need their mortgage to be paid, their property to be maintained, insured and updated, and their pension to be paid. We are far from an ideal world.

Get angry at the super rich, royal family included, who own a plethora of properties, and are sponsored by the tax payer... not the little people like us who have bills to pay and no help,

"icannotremember im guessing because a care home costs thousands of pounds a month and if he's there for 10 years (for example) the money would run out?"

They are lucky if they can match the fees by renting a property out!

Why doesn't he sell it and use the money gained to fund his care?

Icannotremember without going into his medical history, he is probably going to live for a very long time yet despite requiring care. If we sell his home, it will fund his place at the home for less than five years, after which time he would be moved to the really quite awful care home round the corner which is the one that the council are prepared to fund (but only after his personal assets have been rinsed). It makes much more sense to rent the house so that it can continue to fund his care for as long as he needs it and the house will still be his to pass on to his children as he wishes.

I should add, he's not in one of those posh care homes that costs thousands each week. It's a very bog standard care home but it was by far the best one locally and he deserves to live out the rest of his days in cleanliness and comfort.

Your poor friend OP
YANBU. My heart broke after watching Kelly trying to find a home Its so unfair when no-one is willing to give people a chance. You never know, maybe one day it might be the same people who say NO to those in need whose childrens childrens childrens children might be in that horrible positon of being left vulnerable and having to fend for themselves. Life moves in mysterious ways.

Would you expect people who chose to invest in something else to take a risk they don't have to take?

I don't accept DSS. I've been burnt before.

If housing benefit was paid directly to the landlord I bet more would be willing to have them

I think blaming the mortgage or insurance businesses is just as bad as blaming the landlords or letting agents.

They come up with these policies for a reason.

What causes people on benefits to be such a high risk?

Why do you all think housing benefit claimants don't work?

SEVEN IN EIGHT HOUSING BENEFIT CLAIMANTS WORK. They are in employment ffs. Low paid and entitled to help with housing costs.

Stop saying out of work benefit claimants. Most of us work, in fact the vast majority!

@Seline I agree RE the rigidity - I've found this is prevalent with LA's.

Personally I can't tell you how much I dislike LA's, and so I manage my rentals myself - every enquiry is treated case-by-case but my insurance does dictate somewhat. Medical DSS is very different to unemployed DSS, for example.

I second @lalalalyra when they suggested finding a private landlord if your situation is a little more complicated. Gumtree, Facebook, ask around - but there are a great deal of shitty LL's out there too on Gumtree so tenants should be wary. I'm a member of the National Landlord Association - lots of good landlords will have a membership number; ask about which DPS scheme they use and ask to see gas safety certificates, etc. That'll weedle out a lot of shit ones.

my mums friend has rental houses all but 1 off his dss tenant he has had to evict .They get the rent paid directly to them and don't pay the rent he has to go through court at his cost to evict them and all the time no money coming in. Nearly pushed him to bancruptcy as still had mortgage to pay

I think this has got so much work since the government decided to pay recipients instead of landlords. Rent defaults happen much more easily now.

Plabom it was an LA who just outright refused despite the guarantor. Interestingly they said they could accept a guarantor if we'd had bad credit. Yet as ours was excellent they couldn't.

Do you have any sites you recommend for finding individual landlords rather than LAs? I know gumtree but there's probably others

@SlothMama, no. Because when that did happen previously and the payments would fuck up for whatever reason, the council would go to the landlord to get the money back. And they didn't want to pay it back. And they didn't want the hassle. And the tenant couldn't do anything about it as it was between the LL and the council.

Some people are being very unpleasant about those in receipt of housing benefit

Just reread the comment, where on Facebook would you find them? I've only ever gone through LAs.

If housing benefit was paid directly to the landlord I bet more would be willing to have them

Didn't it used to be like this ? Why did it change ?

Yes we all know a landlord who nearly went bankrupt from tenants not paying their rent , lucky they didn't need to do any major work to their property if they are sailing that close to the wind.

I’m not sure perfectly, I think some mortgages don’t ‘allow’ the property to be rented to those in receipt of benefits although I don’t know how they’d find out!