Under occupied council. HA property

[tweedysue]

When a woman & 2 children live in a council house and the children grow up and leave, thus leaving 1 woman living in a 3 bed council house do you think they should move into a smaller property ??? Personally I do especially as the rent is subsidised by the tax payer and a family could be living there.

Either that or shes trying to swop a five year tenancy for an old style assured and strangely got no takers 😁

Why should tenant regardless of what they rent pay for repairs?
Tenants don’t own the property so if they decide to pay to update a 15 year old boiler, they cannot take it with them when they leave, nor can they recoup the money.

Many councils let the properties run down, and only do repairs in some cases because of legislation.

Not everyone in social housing claims housing Benefit, just like not everyone in private has no financial assistance.

It’s also possible that the single person in a 3 bed owns the place.
But even if they don’t finding a smaller place isn’t that easy. First you have to find something that meets your requirements. Once you do this someone from the council inspects both properties. If one of the properties has the original kitchen the move is denied. Doesn’t matter the tenants have requested to have this changed even offering to pay for themselves and been denied.

So maybe rather than shouting about the injustices for the over crowded why not start locally and campaign for councils to actually fix their shit rather than just taking rent every week.

Housing associations are not for profit
Organisations which is not the same as being subsidised. The solution to the housing crisis is to build more affordable to rent family homes not to evict people who have not defaulted on their rent from their homes just because their kids have grown up. Would you support forced sale of under occupied private homes too or is it just social housing tenants who must suffer.

Ah, nothing like a frothing council house thread it’s been aaaages!

OP your posts make you sound like you don’t know what you’re talking about. All that anger for misinformed reasons.

Early

Hi gamerchick,
Hows your gamerpalace nowdays?
No smoking outside threads till spring now 😣

Hi gamerchick, Hows your gamerpalace nowdays?
No smoking outside threads till spring now

Hiya hinny this threads reminded me I need to ring the council to put a repair in

I know, no smoking threads make me sad :( although I think there’s a smoking lift car one about somewhere. That might do.

I finally got the small ones room done. Now waiting on a window replacement its only been 18 months so....anytime next year 😁

The smoking threads are always best in spring...you know that!

Maybe next year. Or when it’s snowing so you freeze.

Aye I know, it’s the summer is coming benchmark

Of corse wait for the cold snap, and when the carpet gets soaked and ive got dehumiderfiers on it they can shrug and tell me to take it up with the ha lol

Who is this woman, OP? Is it only women? Do you have any particular aversion to men living in council houses with a spare room?

Around here the council offers to help with downsizing but what that actually means is that you would get priority on a smaller property it doesn't mean that there would be any help with the costs incurred from moving and so I can see why people don't move.
I have a four bedroom council house, all of them on our cul de sac are under occupied, some have three empty bedrooms but the people living there have lived there since they were built and so wouldn't want to leave and I can understand that. Until it is made worth their while moving into a smaller property people aren't going to move and when they have a secure tenancy there is nothing that can be done about it.
Will I move when I need a smaller house? Probably not, I like where I live,I've spent a lot of money getting the house like I want it and this particular cul de sac is really lovely.

From advance searching you, OP, you seem obsessed with council houses? Why is that? Can't you just get a hobby?

Well, I don't think she should be forced out but I think the good thing to do is downsize. I also think this applies to owner occupants, imo freeing up bigger houses for people who actually need them benefits everybody. I don't think it's healthy to be so attached to material stuff like houses.

Free up ‘bigger houses’ ?? But where would they go? There’s no small houses either

There’s a shortage of both

There has been a fascinating program on R4 about social housing - I didn't realise that in the early 70s it was about 1/3 of the country that lived in social housing. And it wasn't meant to be for the very poor - initially the social housing tenancies were for the skilled working class who could afford the rent and be given a tenancy.

Anyway it charts the rise of social housing then the decline of the estate and covers architecture, social changes, lack of investment, ha he in demographic, RTB, why new social housing wasn't built etc.

So interesting.

Firstly, given the age of most social housing stock, it has paid for itself many times over. Secondly, private rents are not at the market rate. The market rate would be what people are willing to pay, but most people renting privately are forced to pay whatever their landlord is charging or face homelessness, therefore there is no element of choice so the rents are not the market rate.

it is simply affordable. not subsidised.

Depends how you look at it. You say your rent is £430 pcm, if that house could be rented out privately on the open market for £630 pcm does that mean you are getting a £200 subsidy? I'm not against affordable rent btw, I'm just saying it's not as clear cut as you are implying.

there should be more affordable housing. it it shameful that there isnt.

Completely agree. We have left this to the private sector to provide for the last 25 years and they haven't provided what we need. I see absolutely no reason to believe that they will in the future. The obvious answer is for the state to step in, it's investment in our country. The state build houses, and then receives rent for those house, it's not dead money, it's investment.

Yawn....another OP bashing Council tenants and calling them taxpayer subsidised.

OP I do agree that once a person no longer requires a three bed House then they should be encouraged to move....with a financial incentive to do so if necessary.

That said it doesn’t address the issue that successive Govts on all sides haven’t built affordable housing or tackled the high cost of renting in this country.

Does the person you are moaning about have the finances to cover the cost of moving and re-carpeting a smaller place if it needs it? That’s a big issue on its own.

I live in a two bedroom house and won’t need it once DS moves out (which could be a while as he is disabled). The cost of moving would be an I,mediate barrier to me doing this though....it would take a lot of saving.

Go and look at the publicly available accounts of any social housing association.

They make a surplus even with their below market rents.

How about some facts rather then spouting Daily Mail bile.

Wow what an attitude.
You don't know the hoops you have to jump through to get a ha home.
And the foc repairs are normally a cheap quick fix that keeps breaking.
Most haven't had the time or money put into keeping them in a good state of repair so it falls to the tenant.
So why should someone give up their house when they have put the time and money in?

There you go, I picked the first one on Google. www.sovereign.org.uk/EasysiteWeb/getresource.axd?AssetID=274707&type=full&servicetype=Attachment

£120mil surplus on social housing activities.