To think that there is a misunderstanding about social housing.

[Bitchesbelike]

On social media, lots of people assume that people in social / council housing are getting a free house and don’t work.

i grew up in social housing: my dad worked from age 15 to 65.

my brothers have worked since they were 16 and both live in social housing.

its not “free housing”: it’s rented, affordable accommodation.

Not everyone can get a mortgage.

All this thread has proved is that you can’t trust people to do the right thing.
If you were given a three bedroom council house 40 years ago and all of your children have now grown up and moved out you should obviously have to downsize.
If you’re circumstances have changed and you could now get a mortgage but enjoy the cheap rent you should be made to move on.
If you’re moving on and you have adult children earning a good wage you shouldn’t be allowed to move them back in and make them a successor of your tenancy.
All of this crap about needing to keep a larger home just incase your children want to move back in. Or not wanting to move out of area and have to commute back for work is just nonsense. The problem is that the tenancy agreements handed out have allowed people to take the piss, the rules need to change.

Nobody was given a house 40 years ago. Anyone living in one for that length of time has essentially paid for it, despite never owning it. I wouldn’t be moving and if I took out a mortgage it would be to buy that house at a discount thus removing it from the social housing stock for ever.

So people should get a mortgage You think they should buy a house Be told what to do with their own money
Okie dokie but only if the same thing happens with Child Benefit Parents get to have to prove its being spent on the child

Of course they were given it, I can’t imagine my landlord would give a toss if I pointed out I’ve paid his mortgage on the house I’ve been paying rent in for years. It hasn’t made it my house, I don’t get to keep it forever.
I know far too many people in this situation, my in laws being two of them, great big four bedroom council house that they were given in the 80s, it’s been just the two of them for years, it shouldn’t be allowed.

They weren’t given it. They were given the opportunity to rent it and they weren’t paying off someone else’s mortgage. It’s a shame they didn’t take their huge discount and buy it then you’d be really green with ill disguised envy.

YY Im getting really really sick of this shit now. And its only me and DH in a one bedroom flat At his age and disabilities we really need a bungalow But i dont resent the tenants already living in bungalows. Because that would be stupid.
Guess that makes me a better person than the SH haters

Whatever, you think it’s fine to stay in a house that was given to you based on your needs at the time, have those needs disappear but you know… I need all of these extra rooms for when my kids want to come home at Christmas.
I think this is selfish and entitled, but that’s people for you. Like I said, the rules should change so the choice doesn’t lie with the tenants.

They weren’t given a house.

I live in social housing. My rent is roughly 50% of the local market rate. It has allowed me to live in an area that I could never afford to live in and allowed my child to go to fantastic schools.

When she has finished sixth form, we are going to try and get a swap to a large property and then buy it. The system is flawed, but you’d be foolish not to utilise it.

Well we all know what tenants having no choice resulted in eight years ago

What a disgusting comment.

It was certainly a disgusting event.

THIS!!!!

But talking about it afterwards in the context that tenants have been treated even worse since and are looked down on is the disgusting thing.
Still it makes a change from "we musnt make it political"

Im not the one advocating for tenants having even less choice

Absolutely agree. I work with disabled children, and have mums carrying teenagers up the stairs on their backs as they can't get a council house and stuck in an upper floor flat. Children in constant pain, unable to have essential surgery and likely to die because they can't have it until appropriately housed.
I'm sure many will say 'well that's not my problem, I'm not moving, they should just build more'. But there is limited money, limited available space for building, and vunerable children are loosing out because people won't move, because they are 'entitled' to stay.

how lucky for uou.

scenarios like this are why people have a problem.

I have a crappy house because it was all I could afford and even then I have a huge mortgage

I'd love to have been given a cheap rental without having to worry about repairs and upkeep and then move on to an easy purchase

I don’t think you can compare Grenfell to people feeling entitled to stay in a four bedroom council house that was built to home a family just because they are allowed. Nice try though.

My DH is disabled. Neither he nor i think that someone should be kicked out of a bungalow so that we can have it.

I got social housing because I was a disabled single parent and nobody would rent to me… my current place is lovely (new build, very family oriented village setting) but it’s only because of meeting my now husband that I’m in a position to buy.

Lack of choice and autonomy only seems to count on this site when its trans issues!!!!!
Maybe we should have a social housing version of The Handmaids Tale. Its lack of choice that mean tenants cant refuse things even if they are defective (like my new "fire safe" front door that ive been forced to have) Of course its all connected.

What the hell do trans people have to do with this?!? Your missing the point, yes people need there “safe front door” but by being allowed to keep that same front door forever when your circumstances have changed stops anyone else from getting there’s.

OK so how would you get tenants to leave Im really interested in how this would go.

Any tenant, whether private or social doesn't have choice over these things. You only get that choice if you chose to buy - and yes that is a choice - DH and I worked 2 jobs each and lived in his parents garage to earn enough to buy a do'er upper. I have friends who were forced to leave school at 16 due to abuse at home, sofa surfed, got very few gcse's and now own very nice homes.

Choice isn't an entitlement in many things in life, it's usually earnt. As I tell my girls, working really hard at school will give you more choice over what job you can get, where you can live, what you can buy.

My kitchen is an absolute mess, I can't afford to buy any new kitchen right now as I made a choice to reduce my hours at work to be able to do pick ups and drop offs for my girls, and to help me manage my disability which leaves me tired and in pain.

So you admit that people dont have a choice over fire safety (and YES you have just admitted that because YOU have just mentioned my door and yet ive also been told that Grenfell has nothing to do with it while also its admitted that i have no choice over fire safety. The gaslighting is off the charts