Tax credits question!

[Pearlwlco]

Hi I’m on tax credits as currently separated from husband we have a joint mortgage together and 2 children although I live at our property and he rents elsewhere. Anyway I’d like to move because of the crap schools in our area and the house needing so much remedial work on it. We have separated on brilliant terms and still continue to be best friends and parent our children, he has a good job so has offered to buy a new build in his name but we can rent off him but my question is will my tax credits be affected by this? I will receive around 20k from the sale of the old house but I question whether they will approve of the arrangement between me and my ex? I don’t want to cause an issue by asking them directly as they’ve messed me around so much trying to get everything in place!

Are you wanting to claim housing benefit for this property ? Because they government wont pay that when the house is owned by your kids dad.

Sorry just seen you will be getting 20k equity so wouldnt get housing benefit anyway.

If you have £20k in the bank surely you can't be claiming tax credits!

Its ridiculous but yes you can claim tax credits with 100k.in the bank and you only have to declare interest over £300 a year for tax credit purposes. With the new Universal "credits you cannot claim it at all with savings over 16k. Its a very unfair postcode lottery type system at the moment !!

Nervyuyt - I don’t have 20k in the bank but could have potentially and I don’t see why I wouldn’t claim tax credits if I’m entitled to it just because I’ve sold my house which I’ve paid for! My children’s nursery fees are £1200 a month I don’t get the full allowance due to working so “surely” I will be claiming what I’m entitled to regardless!

Babyroobs - thank you I appreciate the info I thought the switchover to universal credit was for Jobseeker’s Allowance and income support claims? I’ve never claimed anything until now so unsure how it all works and if a “change of circumstances” is the same as just changing address which is what essentially it will be but I just didn’t want to hide any information who my landlord will be as it’s just an arrangement mainly for the benefit of the children but just the same as any other landlord arrangement

Tax credits are not affected by your address or level of savings. They are based purely on income.

You wouldn’t get housing benefit if you rent from an ex partner and have a child with them who lives with you. When your area changes to Universal Credit you will get less money than you do on WTC.

Universal credit replaces six means teested benefits - Income support ,income telated jsa and esa, housing benefit , child and working tax credits. If you already claim tax credits then unless you have a change in circumstances then you will not need to claim UC yet ( assuming you live in a full service UC area ).

You may want to look into what qualifies as a new claim. A change in circumstance could shove you into UC and you need to report a house move as a change in circumstance. It depends on if you're into a UC area. Might be worth doing some digging.

A house move would nor force someone onto UC unless they were needing to make a new claim for housing benefit in a full sevice UC area.

Thank you sorry I should have said I don’t claim any housing benefit just a 25% reduction in council tax as a single person. I think the area I am in now has changed over to UC but hasn’t affected me yet although I did do a change in circumstance when my child was born a few months ago I think also the postcode where the new property would be is UC too so a change could be applied to me regardless of where I stay. I’m hoping to increase my hours back to full time so I won’t be eligible for anything but I just can’t afford to until around 18 months time 🙄

Moving to a new area will not mean you have to switch to UC unless you need to make a new claim for any of the six benefits I mentioned above which is doesnt sound like you will be.

The equity from the house won't affect yours current tax credit claim

Thank you all. So I should just inform them anyway and change my address when I have moved?

Well sorry I had absolutely no idea the benefits system worked this way. How ludicrous.