Having rent paid for you on benefits

[confoozled]

We sold our house last year to pay off debts and moved into rented. It was the only rented we could find at short notice as the house we were having checks for pulled out. So we are in a house where the rent is higher than we would really have liked but we have managed until now.
DH has just lost his job and will be claiming JSA. Our rent is almost double the amount we would get for housing benefit but we can't move as we have a contract. PIL have offered to pay our rent (probably as a long term loan) but I'm worried that this will count as income and we would lose all other benefits. If they paid the rent they would pay the whole amount and we wouldn't claim HB. Can we do this or would we lose our other benefits?
If we can't any ideas what we can do as it seems like we are caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.

claim everything you are entitled to - also try for discretionary housing payments to top up the hb for a limited time

then borrow the extra rent from pil - get it written down that it is a loan

loans do not count as income iirc

Also approach your landlord to ask for a rent reduction - if its double the allowable for the area there might be some room to manouevre.

Thank you
We have to talk to our landlord anyway because if they won't accept hb then we will borrow the whole amount off the pil. Just needed to know we could borrow off them without it impacting on our benefits. We need to eat after all.

You don't need to tell them you get HB, it's none of their business. And I can't imagine that they can refuse to accept it!

Housing benefit is now only paid direct to landlords when a tenant is at least 8 weeks in arrears. Your landlord does not need to know that you are claiming.

To anyone thinking of taking on a new tenancy, I would always recommend that you check with the local council what the Local Housing Allowance rates are, just in case you need to fall back on Housing Benefit.

You will need to advise the landlord as his insurer or mortgage company may not accept HB tennants and you could risk his property.

Also if you sold your house and used the capital to make payments on debts over the min payment expected you may fall under the deprevation of capital rule depending on what the amount was.

If your PIL pay your rent directly to the LL it does not count as income. That is a 'charitable contribution' instead. If they pay you the money, for you to then pay your rent, it is income and is likely to affect your benefits. Even if it is a loan. Either way you should inform Jobcentre plus.