People in Council houses should be reassessed…

[AlwaysAnnoyed]

I want to tread carefully. But then again I’m pissed off.

I live in a 3 bed house with a mortgage. On our estate there is a selection of Council houses. I have no issue with people having Council homes, people fall on hard times and DESERVE support.

however what really grinds my gears, is on our estate we have one Council house which have 2 brand new Audi’s. Top of the range. Just got back off holiday to Florida. Weekends away. they pay £350 a month to the council for this 4 bed property. (They are very loud about telling everyone this)

it really really winds me up. We have a COST of living crisis, people are going to be struggling to pay bills but yet there are people who are in these Council houses on holidays and brand new cars.

it doesn’t seem fair. Surely Council houses need to be regularly means tested… How can this happen? Able to afford 2 brand new cars but cannot afford to pay their own rent/mortgage!

or am I just being a moany witch!

For whatever reason not everyone wants a mortgage. Did you buy a council House? You can always sell your home & move back to council, many people do this especially the elderly. Or some have council homes & don’t live in them. Did you forget about those people? No one cares about it. Your neighbours probably don’t pay rent anyway, hence them shouting so loudly about it to you.

It all comes down to emotions.

Logically, it makes sense for people to only rent council housing as long as they cannot afford the private sector. But what does that mean?

Well, it means you don't have those spare bedrooms for just in case your kids come back. You don't have room to host relatives at Christmas. You leave behind the kitchen where you and your granny once made a cake together.

People get ridiculously attached to bricks and mortar. We lock away memories in property, we fill them with junk, we nest.

People also like stability. Potentially moving every six months is a lot of disruption - even if you're cool with that, think of the hassle of packing and unpacking. And fighting spurious deposit claims. Now, think of children. If you have kids living in the property, moving every six months is going to unsettle them, and they're going to act up, and that's going to be a major headache to deal with.

What if you can afford private sector property... and then you suddenly can't? And then you can again? Do you keep moving back and forth between council stock and private stock?

I think there are a lot of reasons why booting people out of council properties once their circumstances change just isn't feasible.

How can we equalise this? Maybe if you could afford private sector rent, after all, we put up the price of your council property to match those changed circumstances. But what's reasonable? The going rate for a private property? Well, quite often, that rate is ridiculously overpriced/unreasonable. OK, a bit less? Well, that is still going to make people in private housing pissed off.

The only way it actually works is if the cost of housing is broadly comparable for everyone, and that level of cost is affordable for everyone. But that's an impossible ask - you'd have to bring the cost of private rent down, rather than the cost of council rent up.

You could only do it if you forced property rentals to become a not-for-profit endeavour. Given how many people 'invest' in property to fund their retirement, if you applied restrictions on rental income receivable, you'd push a bunch of older people into poverty, creating a different problem. What if we had exemptions for individuals owning a max of two properties (one to live in, one to invest)? Well, we'd still alienate all of those foreign investors. Can we afford to effectively boot them out of the UK?

It's just all broken. I don't see a solution.

Been given a council house is someone been given a helping hand which is what they need at that time.

No one gets "given" a council house, rhere is an application process that involves assessment of need.

It is funded by all the other taxpayers. this is fine when someone needs help.

It's not funded by other taxpayers and seeing as many council tenants are in employment, they're also taxpayers.

And some might need that help long term, but not all. They can't be given it for life and then not take any responsibility or change.

It's not help. It's housing. Anyone can apply for this housing.

There may be extenuating circumstances Such as disability, health, MH or they may have disabled children in which case that would be noted and therefore would only be sporadically reviewed. but for many other people they can do better

"Better" in what way? Council housing isn't a pit of destitution for people to aspire to crawl out of, its not some slum that people should work their way out of. Its housing and the underpinning idea of social housing is that it is housing for all, from all backgrounds and walks of life.

they can go on a training course, they can get a better job

Not everyone is able to go on a training course and get a "better" job, there are no an infinite number of promotions out there - and as the pandemic proved, we need shop staff, cleaners, bin collectors, delivery drivers, etc. Not everyone is suited to training or promotion. Not everyone's situation is suited to trained or promotion (e.g., caring responsibilities). Not everyone wants to retrain or get promoted, if someone is happy in their job, good at their job, and not stressed out by their job then why should they change that just to satisfy you?

they should be able to move out of the house onto a rental.

Council houses are rentals. Rent is due on them and many tenants pay full rent.

leave the next person who really needs it to be able to move in.

The property returns to the council at the end of tenancy, whenever that is, and is then re-let.

there should be a sporadic review every say 5 or 10 years to review the situation. no one minds helping someone but not paying for it for their whole lives.

How magnanimous of you You clearly know nothing about how social housing works.

No matter how many people on MN rant about it, the system won’t change. Most SH landlords have now ditched the shorter tenancies and gone back to giving lifetime ones again, as the administration costs of reassessing people were too high. So effectively it doesn’t matter how many times this topic gets argued (regularly on here!) it isn’t going to change. It’s a home for life if the person wants it and pays their rent on time. Moaning and whining won’t change that.

Its true that I am benefitting from “cheap” rent (although it is still £700 p/m!). I have a spare bedroom, plenty of space. No, I won’t be moving into private rent or downsizing to help a stranger! Who would, really?? I had many disadvantages earlier in life, which is why I was given SH. Life in general isn’t “fair” so I’m going to hang on to the one advantage I was given.

But they don't actually. We have enough houses, just not used correctly.

Here we have a family that quite clearly doesn't need the help from the government. They have enough money to be able to afford private rent, even a mortgage if they chose to. But they know they don't have to, so they don't.

In the same council area, you may have a family living in b&bs because the council has no houses left. Which family needs that council house more? It's quite obvious, but some people seem to think the government should give us everything, a house, money, pension, etc. That can't be done. It's not done anywhere.

The system doesn't work, agree with that or not. But it doesn't work how it's done at the moment. And there aren't enough council houses thanks to them being sold off and improperly used. But rather than try to fix a broken system, let's build more, lose Greenland, lose hobbies and exercise areas and create more pollution and areas to flood. Makes sense...

The utter, gritted-teeth refusal of people to accept that they were wrong when they thought that they knew how social housing works, is insufferable. It doesn't matter how many times you write your opinion down, the facts will not change.

If you genuinely want the wholesale (no pun intended) reform of the social housing sector, then get involved in lobbying, campaigning, local and national politics, etc etc. But please allow those of us with lived and/or professional experience of the sector a moment to roll our eyes.

I love how people who know nothing about social housing ,and don't understand how the system works thinks their idea of how it should work is right.

Yup. This.

And this!!

Again in many areas social rent is comparable to private rent and seriously why would anyone give up their secure tenancy and throw themselves on the mercy of a private landlord ,just because posters on mumsnet think they should?

They have enough money to be able to afford private rent, even a mortgage if they chose to.

Not even the op knows if they'd be able to afford a deposit and pass the credit checks for a mortgage.

I remember having a similar discussion some years back. A high profile person had a (publicly disclosed) salary of £170k a year, yet lived in a council house - their argument being that they had got a council house 20 years earlier and didn't see why they should give it up.

I believe that those that have a change in circumstances meaning they no longer need subsidise housing have a moral duty to move on and let others in need have the property.

Council housing is not subsidised.

You can believe what you want ,but that doesn't mean your right nor does it mean that's how the system works .

Think we are banging our heads against a brick wall!

I think we are @x2boys

This thread is horrible. And the misunderstandings about how the system works are frustrating. As is the lack of appreciation of the fact that council housing - because it is secure - helps families in the longer term. I wouldn't have been able to get me and my kids out of poverty without it

Who looks after their goat while they're gadding about on their holidays?

It's so repetitive, same thread started every few weeks ,it's always, free houses ,subsidised rent,people should move out of secure homes and private rent etc etc .

I need urgently need local authority housing. I wouldn’t want it taken away from someone because they have nice cars.

I have a small field, that has many goats in it. I charge £10 a day per goat. I'm raking it in, as a side line Does that mean I have to move out my HA house?

I never got a goat. Who do I complain to?

Complain to your council.

I will. Is it a goat each or one per family?

(Why a goat? What do you do with a goat?)

@AlwaysAnnoyed Two thirds of people who have voted agree with you so it's safe to say that most of those who are berating your stance in the comments are a vocal minority.