Single mum high rent

[Topsysmum24]

I don't know what to do. Any advice or guidance would be appreciated.

Single mum, 13 year old child. Private rented flat £800 per month, rolling contract. North West. All fine for years, rent has always increased by about £30 per month each year.

Landlord sold the property a few months ago. New landlord is raising the rent to £1200 per month starting next month. Also issued a Section 21 if don't fancy paying the extra £400 per month rent.

I'm a newly qualified health professional starting salary £28407 NHS band 5. I was so pleased when I qualified thinking I'd be able to give my child a better life. Due to how I qualified, my wage goes up to band 6 in a year. I thought I'd been really clever and planned to start saving a deposit for a house. What an idiot I am!

I've been viewing other private rented properties within a 7 mile radius. There aren't many. They are all expensive in terms of average wages even though the areas I'm looking at are very working class, not affluent areas at all. I’ve wasted a lot of my annual leave on viewings already. I've been knocked back from each property due to my income.

I've taken on a part time job in the evenings and weekends to increase my chances but I'm still being knocked back. I'm competing with couples in double income households. I've got no chance.

Because I'm working all the time and with the stress of it all, I'm not performing as well at work. I'm a shit mum, I barely see my child. Barely see friends. I'm not looking after myself, I'm constantly exhausted. And no, there is no one we can live with temporarily. No family.

I've thought about moving to a random place where the rents are cheaper (I know that's always the advice). But as a single mum, uprooting me and my child from everything we've ever known, our friends, school, work, hobbies. It terrifies me. And what if it doesn't work out? What then?

If it was just me, I'd move to a random place in a shitty house share with mould everywhere for a year til I'm able to save up or come up with a plan. Having a child makes it harder. I'm tied to school and it's not fair to keep moving schools, especially in high school. My child is a big part of the school community and is really thriving.

I've thought about using credit cards for living costs but I'm already paying off credit card debt I accrued whilst training. And even if I took out more credit cards, what do I do when the rents increase again in a year's time? I'll have more rent to pay and even more debt payments. I can't keep chasing my tail like this. I want stability.

I've called the council and been through their longwinded homelessness assessments only to be told I'll be waiting 3-4 years for social housing. They said I'd have to wait for a bailiff to physically evict me and my child. I'd be bloody mortified doing that! I'm not perfect but I pride myself on being a decent person who pays their way.

What should I do?

I've sent you a private message.

I wasn’t clear, but I was thinking there may be some specific houseshares or websites for lone parents and their kids to live together. I’ve done my fair share of navigating on SpareRoom and house sharing over the years, so I know that the general houseshare scenario wouldn’t be appropriate for OP and her child.

Also I disagree about shared ownership.

Landlord has had their chance to play fair, and failed. They need to understand the consequences of their greed.

OP, try Acorn, the tenants union. They will direct action in your behalf, there are branches in Manchester and elsewhere in north west.

£575 to £871 a month off your rent wouldn't help, yet the issue is your rent going up by £400?

@LePetitMaman do the maths. OP said, if she quits her PT job that is her benefit entitlement.

So it could be:

FT + PT income isn’t enough for rent.

FT + benefit isn’t enough for rent

FT + PT + reduced benefits due to the PT income isn’t enough for rent.

@shellyleppard you really need to jump on some landlord forums and read about your responsibilities, the increasing protections for tenants (sadly still not enough for OP), and the multiple ways being a private, small-fry landlord can now be an utter nightmare and a really risky thing to do. I considered it and will not now touch it with a barge pole. My friends who are (I think good)landlords are selling up, as tenants have trashed properties and refused to pay rent and meanwhile hard to evict.

There are enough bad tenants and greedy landlords to spoil the entire market, and new regulation cannot come fast enough. We need proper rent controls, like Europe.

@GertieN agree with you on the rent controls. My problem landlord was 10 years ago, so things were different then. I was lucky enough to get a council house before we got evicted.

@Summerhillsquare The going rate for rental in most areas of the North is over £1k (rightly or wrongly)
I'm not claiming to know what everyone is paying, I know of not one person who is privately renting in my area for less than £1k a month

Surely though that would pay the excess of the raised rent that's unaffordable? You'd still have to pay the remainder, but you already manage that at the moment. Then you could carry on as you were - no second job to exhaust you and so on.

I have. She's only just taken on the part time job.

She will get the £575 - £871 assistance on her FT £28k.

If she's saying she can't afford a £1.2k rent that will be reduced to £329 - £625 (depending on the benefit above) whilst on £28k a year ,(plus the hundreds per month UC she'll get, plus the child benefit), then it's not the rent that's the problem.

Maybe I should start with telling my dying grandparent, not to leave me their property and money to buy another? I'll just pop to the hospice now.