To think you should downsize your council house if it’s just you?

[OuchOuchOuchh]

Oh my goodness I have created war at work and everyone is gunning for me.

My auntie has a huge 4 bedroom council house she has lived there since the 90s with her one son. That has now moved out.

All i said was I think it’s unfair that she’s living in such a big family home perfect for a family to bring their kids up in. Large garden backs on to the woods plenty of visits from deers and fox’s it’s beautiful! Anyway all I said is that if you haven’t purchased the property in a certain amount of time you should have to downsize if it’s just you living there.

Theres families overcrowded and can’t get anywhere then you have my auntie paying £100 a week in rent for a massive house for just herself.

please tell me if I am being an asshole! I appreciate it’s her family home but it just doesn’t seem fair to me.

I'll answer your question if you can answer mine: where do you propose to shove the old women forced out of their too-big homes? In many (most?) places there aren't any suitable smaller properties available.

So in your example of a council house rented out for decades the council did zero maintenance?

In 1 bed high rise flats apparently. Away from all their families and friends and the home they have loved and kept for years and years.

In the private sector no-one would question a single person or couple in a large house.

Yes they do.

The answer is because they can afford it. But not because they need it.

@AllThingsServeTheBeam wdym it's not discounted? Of course it is! £100 per week for a 4 bedroom house? If that's not a huge discount I don't know what is!

I am laughing so hard at the use of your word facts 🤣

You're so wrong and you going on and on about it is just more and more funny

They can swap with the families crammed into too small houses. I've said that numerous times.

It's the market that has inflated. These HA homes have been paid for a hundred times over in most cases. They are not discounted. They pay for themselves.

That might be the case in big cities but in my area there are plenty of flats in small units. The issue for me wouldn't be the availability of flats, it would be the quality of them, as many are in converted offices or newly built. I'd really worry about things like noise insulation. And the level of service charge.

It would be good if there were much stricter rules for new buildings, including noise issues and caps on service charges.

We are a pensioner couple, we own our own home outright. We’d love to rent a small bungalow in a sheltered scheme. Preferably before we are so decrepit we end up in care. But because we used our joint earnings (never high salaried, just hard workers) to pay a mortgage we are at the very back of the queue. If we sell, we won’t raise enough to buy the kind of property we need. We are on a low income, have little in savings, so can’t afford to adapt our bathroom to a walk in shower, or add a loo downstairs. Maintenance could also be unaffordable in the future, and heating bills would be cheaper in a smaller home. Selling up would mean we could afford rent, and afford to pay for help if we need it.

As houses come empty where we live, they are snapped up by families. People like the schools and amenities, and its relatively affordable.

Straight from a council -

"If the tenant pays their own rent in full, as a tenant of a local
authority, they are paying the full rent charged by the local authority
for the occupation of the dwelling.
Social housing rents are well below
market rents, but are not subsidised rents

From here -
www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/is_my_social_housing_rent_subsid

Even putting "is council housing subsidised?" into Google shows that it is not subsidised.

I agree. I know someone elderly living with her disabled husband and they would be very much better off in a small council bungalow- 1 or 2 bedrooms. They definitely deserve a council property but it should be appropriate to their requirements and free up a family home.

They still.live in a large 4 bedroomed with a garage (they don't drive) and garden (they struggle to even cut the grass.....we know them because we end up cutting it for them as a "favour" year 4 this year!) And her daughter and partner still live with her when they earn enough to rent somewhere themselves.

If the flat has a lift what is the issue?
Why should small children have to live in high rise flats?
It's not a question of who "deserves" what. It's simply distributing limited resources efficiently.

I completely agree with you. My older sister has a three bedroomed council property . All her adult children have their own places now. In the meantime, my younger sister, who desperately needs to leave her abusive partner with two young children, can't even find any private rentals that she could afford. The government need to sort out the housing situation as a matter of urgency .

I also don't think we need more housing, we need more equitable distribution of housing.

Stop overseas buyers buying property for investment.

Make people bring their empty houses back into use.

Have incentives to get people to sell their second/third/tenth homes so they can be put back into residential use (or rent them out for proper residential use).

And yet - as many people on this thread have already said - there's a lot of people who would be happy to downsize, but there's nowhere suitable to swap to. Some people have been waiting years for a swap.

There's plenty of reasons that might prevent a swap, too - accessibility, etc. Many blocks of flats don't allow mobility scooters in, for example, or have anywhere outside to park them.

My elderly neighbours lived alone (husband and wife) in their 4 bed council house that they'd lived in for 3 decades. Their daughter and grandson were living there on paper so that they could 'inherit' it after their death.
I also know a couple who are doctors who have a council flat in Maida Vale. They got it in the 90s when she had a baby during medical school. They own two BTL properties that they rent out and their dd lives with them in the flat on paper (she's at uni in Italy) so that one day she will inherit it. The right thing would be to give them up but the cheap rent must make that very difficult!

For the love of god. Ok here we go again. CH is run AT A PROFIT. It is private rents that are inflated by private BTL landlords who want thier cake and to eat it too. i.e. Have their mortgage paid in full plus make a profit. Stricter rent guidelines and regulations in reguard to private landlords, including a rent cap set per ara by an independent body and enforced by the government. Also legislation of non profit rents on mortgaged properties.

Because she is fine where she is and she has no need to move. She shouldn't need to. It's the government. She has people using her spare room once a week. I have stayed with her when she has been ill and I have been ill and not able to manage the stairs in my own home. There is zero reason she should be asked to move.

You could equally argue that people shouldn't have kids that they don't already have adequate housing for and therefore, why should the tenant uproot themselves on account of other people's poor choices?

This argument that old/single people should give up their homes because some other people are more important than them, just feels like a punishment for being poor. People signed their tenancies in good faith and it's wrong to change the terms on them at this stage.

The elderly aunt isn't responsible for decades of govt failure to address housing shortages

If you want people to leave these properties, then incentivise them - the govt needs to build lovely one or two bed bungalows with decent sized gardens and close to doctors and shops. And these need to he built close to the communities where people have existing ties.

It's not rocket science - you don't punish people who have fulfilled the terms of their original agreements, you offer them something else which appeals instead!

Oh but they're right doncha know. You can't tell them they're wrong now... That would make them look silly!

I just don’t get the entitlement from people in council houses who won’t leave/downsize when they no longer need that property (i.e. they can afford to pay market rents, they don’t need so many bedrooms). There are literally families in need who are struggling and homeless. Like PP have said, children in B&Bs for Christmas. Vulnerable people on the streets. And you think you should get to keep your four bed council house in a nice area, why?

Other people who were never entitled to council housing just pay full market rent or save to buy. Living in smaller homes
in less nice areas, and paying way more. Or having to move away from where they grew up to afford to live. What makes you more special than those people, working people who have always had to pay full market price for their housing? Or more entitled than the poor young families living in damp overcrowded housing? I just don’t get it.

I wonder if they had to meet a parent raising their children in a travelodge or damp overcrowded flat face-to-face and explain that they deserve to stay in their council house more than the other family deserve a family home, they could say it? With a straight face?

That being said it obviously IS the governments fault 1000%. But the entitlement from some people still makes me wince. Misuse of a system which is so important as a lifeline to people in difficult circumstances.

I do think once you’re older/established and with a fair income, you should have the presence of mind to leave council housing to those who need it more. I think 5-yearly reviews would be good.

There are lots of reasons she should move. "She doesn't want to" isn't a good one.

Oh, one other thing, stop bungalows being converted into houses. A room in the roof with a Velux window is ok, taking the roof off and putting on a whole new floor is not ok.

You could have an exclusion for decrepit bungalows in the middle of nowhere where it wouldn't be wise for an elderly or disabled person to live anyway. But not in towns. Our local council now has a planning presumption against converting bungalows into houses which is good.

If you want a house, buy a house.

Well said, @ImAvingOops .

(Also love the username. I have a tshirt with that on....)