Keeping a 3 bedroom council house when your children have grown up

[Iwishitwerewarmer]

Just pondering - what are everyone’s opinions on a single parent raising their children in a council house/housing association house and staying there once their children have moved out? Should they downsize into a one bed flat/smaller property or is it their right to remain in their home/neighbourhood?

Added extra - they have looked after the property well, have landscaped the garden, installed a new kitchen and generally added value to the property.

Why would anyone voluntarily give up a secure tenancy to put themselves at the mercy of a private landlord ???

Exactly, this is why we need to limit to one year tenancies only for people who would otherwise be homeless.

That’s the whole problem, once they are in they realise what a great deal they have and never leave.

There is no right to housing!

No one is going to take a council house for a year just to move into private accommodation thereafter

You don't understand how social housing works that is fine, it is beyond your reasoning, I don't think you care or want to understand.

SH tenants are council tax payers too.

She is 68 🙄

Because, social housing is in very short supply so should be allocated to people in desperate need such as the homeless, not couples who are both working. I have heard it all now.

Market rents are frequently subsidised by the taxpayer. Anyone getting housing benefit is being subsidised, people living in council housing and paying their own rent aren’t. You’re making a profit on your buy to lets, aren’t you @caringcarer? That’s why market rents are higher.

It is not about realising what a "great deal" they have.
It is literally in the contract they sign that they can stay there as long as they are not anti-social and pay the rent on time.

I guess she would not have bothered saving money for her retirement like everyone else because she has cheap accommodation for life!

I had to leave all my memories behind and the garden I'd lovingly looked after and was my safe haven when the Landlord sold and my daughters lost the only bedrooms they'd known their whole life and my eldest had her best friend next door and they all played outside most evenings or in each others houses . We have now been in Temporary Accommodation for 3 years, a tiny flat above a co op and our front garden is now the co op car park.Grateful for a roof over our head but would be nice to get a fair shot at a council house as well and rebuild our lives after losing everything. The council provided duty because I did my best to find a rental and it was a nightmare. Our home we lost was no more ours than someone's council house and yet I do get seeing comments such as why should my mum leave her home. Because it's not hers it belongs to the council and she befitted and got help when she needed it and she is now blocking families like us who now need the same help she got.

Where I live, a couple working full time would be earning too much to get on the housing list.

Honestly i think by this point that poster is just yanking our chain!

Anybody can apply for it in my LA ( as long as you dont own a property)
How long it will take before you get a property however is anyone's guess.

In what way supported?

That is a ridiculously great deal. It’s like winning the lottery.

There's no need to be as personal as this. I hope you rethink that post

This. The housing crisis in this country is not OP’s problem.

And the rent isn’t subsidised anyway.

At the time we were homeless and I have a disability.

I've never had housing benefit, I've always paid my rent myself.

She did actually save, but my dad died last month and she is finding her income cut by a large amount so she is having to dip into them.
DFOD with your assumptions.

If there was still plenty of social housing, it would be good to let people stay in the house they brought their family up in. With the current huge shortage of housing, where you can be on the Council waiting list for years whilst living in B&B or hostels, it is just not realistic for single people to live in family houses.

Then go get a council house then.