To thiink more needs to be done to stop people accessing council housing who already have overseas homes?

[livinginatravellodge]

I know a person who is a dual national but not has British Nationality. They still have really strong links to their country of origin.
In their home country they have a fully furnished 3 bed apartment that they visit with their children when going home. They also one an apartment which they rent out and the income is kept in a bank account overseas. They also own a prime piece of building land. However, in the UK they live in a council property.

I believe that in most councils you are not allowed council housing if you all ready own property; some councils are more explicit and say in detail that this includes overseas property.

If a person attempted to gain a council property while already owning UK property they could very quickly be found out and be taken to court for housing fraud.

I know of another couple, both from different countries who live in council property in the UK. I am friends with them both on Facebook and every year they go on holiday to their alternate country of origin. Again, they have a property to stay in when they visit their home country. I would think that this situation is more common than we all realise.

I own my own property and have been fortunate enough to never need to live in council property but I find this really unfair.The first person mentioned is not a very nice person in many ways (but that is another matter). I reported him to the council and have provided my name for further information.

I am intrigued to see what the council do but I am anticipating nothing as they may find it too hard to prove.

AIBU to think that more needs to be done to ensure that council housing is not allocated to those that already have an overseas home?

These people should be imprisoned for fraud and then permanently deported. Ask a friend to report them anonymously, then you can say with 100% honesty that it definitely wasn’t you that reported them! UK taxpayers are being taken for mugs, and we are all getting poorer as a result.

I don't really think that the fact that she has really had a hard life is relevant. There's too much of this kind of thing where if people have a sympathetic story we are meant to allow them special privileges.

It sounds like your friend worked hard and deserved access to a council flat, but that doesn't make having access to safe housing elsewhere, while people with nothing are waiting for housing, is fair. It means that they could theoretically live elsewhere in their own home, or sell and use the money to buy a place of their own.

It's not unfair that we expect people to first secure their own position before spending on significant other assets, if they are going to accept help from the public.

Should someone have housing that is actually usable in a war zone, or inherit and need to dispose of the property, etc, then that can probably be figured out, but access to any kind of social help isn't about having a sad story and can't be.

Report her!

Makes my blood boil how anyone gets away with all this ;(
But they just do.

Not the case at all, our council owns many thousands of properties. We also have a housing Association that is nothing to do with the council.

I don't see how it's an anti-immigrant post (and the OP says she's married to an immigrant).

Immigrants as well as British born people suffer as a consequence of social housing fraud. So many people are in desperate circumstances waiting for social housing.

Also the issue isn't only foreign born people owning homes abroad but getting social housing in the UK. A friend rents in London (which has 15 year social housing wait lists and the highest homeless levels in the UK).

He's not on the lowest income but he's single and can't afford to buy on his own. He once viewed a flat on a social housing estate.

He assumed it was a right to buy but when he turned up the landlord (white British) told him she now lived somewhere else in the UK. She wasn't allowed to do that. The council had rules - if you bought somewhere else you were meant to inform them and give up the tenancy.

She told my friend if he moved in he'd receive post from the council addressed to her and to just forward it to her. She wasn't on benefits so maybe harder for the council to find out what she was doing. He didn't take the flat. He didn't want to get involved in that.

Although it's not allowed, some people, including white British people, do what that landlord does and get away with it.

Absolutely there shouldn't be a shortage and building more social housing should be a government priority. However right now there is a massive shortage and it's very wrong that some people are taking social housing when they don't financially need to.

However I also agree with a previous poster that social housing shouldn't be "poverty ghettos". There should be a lot more of it available (and right to buy needs to end) so it can be more mixed income communities.

My db forbids me, if she is reported, she would know immediately I did it and she says I am jealous of her. When she brought her parents in and sister in for treatment (they have not paid a penny into the system), it was before Brexit and when I said it was ripping the arse out of our system, she laughed in my face saying 'we are all equal EU countries, if you or your parents want to go for treatment to Bulgaria, you can, your choice' - this is a lie - nobody would go for treatment there, it is so backward, they don't have the equipment, etc. so nobody would go there, but she was saying - your choice, you and your parents could go there. When I went there for the first time with my db and parents, we were shocked - there were beggars everywhere, children and grannies, stray dogs in the streets of a city (!!). Anyway, it is a long family thing, I told my db she wanted a UK passport, he told her I had told him, etc. etc'. Anyway, they are divorced now and I don't want to have anything to do with her.

I do wonder how social housing allocations are made.

Apparently they're done by greatest need. Does your family member have an illness or disability? It can't be older people's housing because in London someone had to be over 60 for that.

Especially somewhere like London, with 15 year social housing waits and the highest number of homeless people in the UK, I would've thought a single healthy man (or woman) wouldn't easily get social housing.

There's so many vulnerable homeless people in London, including DV victims, disabled people, and families with young children. They're stuck in substandard temporary accommodation and/or socially cleansed out (which is particularly disgusting when the person is vulnerable and needs to be near their family and support).

That said, although you say your family member is on a good income, I assume he wasn't when he got the flat. I know London has a (low) threshold re savings and income for social housing eligibility. My council (not London) is the same.

Agree.
Our allocations policy for under occupying is diabolical
If you’re under occupying you’re placed in Band 3 the lowest, there is little to no incentive to downsize
Plus our council will provide DHP’s for someone to cover the bedroom tax in an under occupied property, but won’t provide them to help someone prevent homelessness and top up a private rental

Housing in this country is an absolute senseless shit show

And the cheaper rent. It's 50% cheaper and a lot less than a mortgage where I live.

Thought I'd post a shorter comment because a lot of my posts on MN are TL/DR.

To the posters who suggest this is an anti-immigrant post:

1. White British people also do similar fraud (own another home whilst keeping their social housing tenancy). It's very wrong because, although there shouldn't be a social housing shortage, currently there is.
2. This issue affects immigrants as much as British born people. Lots of people, immigrant and British born, are in substandard housing and in desperate need of social housing.

I may not be completely up to date as it a few years since I finished. I suspect a lot of councils have tightened up their letting policies since then so some may have addressed this. Long standing tenants on a secure tenancy will be protected

On under occupancy many councils offer incentives ie priority to older tenants living in large property but most want bungalows not flats so won’t move

This.

Also...recent events.

Little reminder that if you're not white, even if you play the game, do exactly the right thing, get your education, trust the system,

get a good taxpaying job as soon as possible, grow and tend your garden, volunteer in the local community, consider yourself 100% British...

you're not for many people.

That's your skin colour. You're still an untrustworthy, dubious migrant (a white American or German person on a year long student visa will be more accepted than you, even if you're a British born NHS consultant).

So building a dual life, when you have people (backed by the media and mainstream political parties) actually forming mobs to attack you and your kids makes a lot of sense.

Whilst families have no choice but to slum it in temporary accommodation I do not think those under occupying should have the option to refuse to move unless it’s a bungalow. My mums aunties are 92 and 94. Big council houses, between them there are 5 bedrooms unoccupied. Families could use those homes

More accurately - invent ridiculously unusual ways people are cheating the system to stir up anti-foreigner sentiments without being overtly racist.

I've got a different perspective re "over occupying".

In my council (and I know London councils are the same), "over occupiers" are put in the highest bands.

This has caused serious harm to, often vulnerable, single people and only-child families, because there's now a severe shortage of 1 and 2 bedroom homes.

Obviously things might be different depending on different parts of the UK. Maybe some areas have enough smaller homes?

There's very clearly an urgent need for more social housing to be built - and this has to include sufficient numbers of 1 and 2 bedroom homes, so single people and only-child families are provided for.

@DadJoke As I said, white British people also do this type of social housing fraud.

It's an issue that causes harm to the many (often vulnerable individuals and families), both immigrant and British born, stuck in substandard housing and/or homeless, and desperate for social housing.

So it's actually an issue that should be discussed -and addressed.

(Perhaps OP could report the thread to MN to get the title edited? Could be edited to say "second homes" instead of "overseas"?).

Op why do you care what your ex sil thinks of you?
Report her.

You need to reread the OP’s post to get a better idea of the framing, and why your defence of it was adding fuel to the fire.

it’s like saying “an asylum seeker was rude to me”

Owning or buying a second property is not permitted. The handful of people who have broken these rules, along with immigrants who need housing are not the cause of a lack of assured tenancy homes, nor even a major contributor to the issue.

It’s why “we need to crack down on benefit fraud” is so much more popular than “we need to encourage people to claim the benefits to which they are entitled.”

Isn’t it crazy how it differs so much by location, were the opposite here, there’s an abundance of 1 beds and over 55’s but nothing else!

The people I know who do this are ex pats. They retire early to somewhere sunny, after selling up in the UK to fund their move. Usually to a place with paid healthcare, the healthcare then gets too expensive as they get older, or they get sick and don’t want to pay their medical fees.
They then get their children to put them on council tax/utility bills ( so yes get to claim winter fuel allowance and other benefits) and state that their children’s property is no longer suitable ( not that they ever lived there, just visited). Suddenly, they have a ground floor flat, bungalow or over 55’s accommodation and full NHS healthcare despite paying zero into our economy for 10-20 years. They also own a decent sized property in their country of choice that they fly back to once treatment has ended or for 3 month long holidays if they have a chronic condition. I’m sure it’s risen dramatically now the UK are out of the EU.

@DadJoke I think it would be helpful if the thread title was changed, so it's clear it's not specifically about immigrants and is instead about anyone who does it.

I disagree with you though that discussing the issue is being racist. That is actually imo offensive to the many immigrants who don't do this - and who are amongst the victims of the social housing shortage.

I have a friend from Romania. She owns a home in Romania. She also owns a home here. All above board. She's as outraged as anyone else about people (British or immigrant) who abuse the social housing system. She'd have loved a decent social housing home whilst saving to buy, because she was living in crappy HMOs, but like many single people she had no chance.

As for how common it is. I don't know if it's that rare. My friend isn't the only person I know who's viewed, flats as a private renter, to discover the landlord (in my friend's case, a white British woman) illegally renting out their social housing flat whilst living in another home they've bought. He knows other private renters who've experienced this too.

I'm the first to condemn Benefits Bashing btw. Benefits fraud is known to be rare, perhaps partly because it's easier to get found out than with social housing fraud. Whether the social housing issues discussed in this thread are as rare, I don't know.

I do agree with you though it's not the main problem (but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be discussed).

The social housing shortage is mostly due to failure of successive governments (Tory and Labour) to end right to buy, and failure to build more social Let's hope the new government addresses this as a priority. End RTB and build more social housing.

That’s not true at all. The rent is invariably lower and there is a right to buy at a discount

@Windchimesandsong I said the framing of the issue was a racist dog whistle. Discussing obscure ways to cheat the system using anecdotes rather than evidence is also very dubious.

If you have any evidence about the prevalence of this issue please provide it. Otherwise what we have “rules should be enforced,” which is just a statement of the obvious.

As others have pointed out it's also usually an affordable rent - vital for people on lower wages, the disabled, and carers.

Anyway the security of an assured tenancy is priceless. The British Medical Journal published a study, about how private renting is more harmful to health than smoking. The insecurity and often frequent upheaval of moves, not to mention increased risk of being homeless, is a big reason why.

The shortage of social housing doesn't only affect the individuals in desperate need of it. It's very costly to the economy too. Billions needed for private rent housing benefits and also substandard but expensive temporary accommodation. Also billions needed for the health and social care consequences of substandard and insecure private rentals.