Family wants me to give up my social house and I'm not - wwyd?

[spicy2001]

I currently rent a three bedroom social housing property and I live on my own. Most of the rent is paid for by universal credit and I have to pay 25% bedroom tax which is very affordable to me which is for two rooms and a shortfall of £30.55p.

I did speak to a housing officer and they said I am legally allowed to occupy it, and as long as I pay the rent on time, tax and shortfall, then everything is fine. I don't feel guilty for occupying this three bedroom house, it's been my home since I was born.

Recently, I noticed that my family were talking a lot about me downsizing. I asked why are they talking about me downsizing? They said because I don't need this property and have to downsize.

I explained I'm legally allowed to stay here, this is my property and not yours. I get that I don't need this property but I'm staying here because I'm allowed too. I found out that they actually joined a site called "home swapper" and a site called "glass bob" my sibling set up an account using her email address to advertise my property. If I'm correct, I've never joined these so I don't know 100% but they're platforms where you can do mutual exchange and advertise your property.

I phoned my housing association and explained the situation, they've started an investigation and they are speaking to various departments to see if they can do it from the end to see if they can do anything as they approved it but they don't know if they can disapprove it.

The other day a tenant from another part of my cul-de-sac came round and told me she knows I'm downsizing and she has a friend whose currently living in a one bedroom flat with his wife and they've got a one year old daughter and another baby on the way. I explained to this person my family have been trying to get me to downsize to a one bedroom flat and I'm not actually looking to downsize so I won't swap with them but told her I do sympathize with their situation.

She told all my neighbours about her friend and now all the neighbours are peed off at me because I'm not downsizing. My family are also peed of that I'm not downsizing. As far as I'm concerned I don't care as I have the legal right to stay here for as long as I like or want.

I just wanted to know though what would you do if you was in my situation?

What a stupid, ill-informed post.

Completely agree. And because the government sold off their assets (council houses) and didn’t replace them

No it's not. "Greedy BTL landlords" are responsible for everything that has ever gone wrong, from Brexit to Covid to the cost of living crisis. Surely you have seen enough landlord-bashing threads on MN to know this?

And Ukraine. You forgot Ukraine.

Can confirm, as I walked back from the shops just now I saw a greedy BTL landlord kicking a litter of kittens, while flashing her diamond ring and dalmatian-skin coat, before getting into her Maserati and running over a minimum wage worker as she sped off (42 in a 30 zone)

We don't need more houses, we need them to be more equitably distributed. Such as in the OP's case.

But I'd not want to move from a three bed house to a one bed flat. I'd not want to live in a flat at all due to noise and service charges.

There may be a case for building more smaller houses and stopping people extending current small ones to keep enough housing stock for downsizers.

Yes well either way we need more houses to be built. The shortage is pushing up prices to ridiculous levels and because of this private rentals are becoming unaffordable for many people

Of course there should be smaller flats built for downsizing but currently there aren’t.

I'd love the see any evidence that there is actually a shortage of smaller flats. Because a shortage of empty flats and an abundance of under occupied houses is not the same as a shortage of smaller flats.
What we need is joined up thinking to use existing housing more equitably.

Grow up. Whether you like it or not BTL mortgages were and still are a terrible idea. No one is saying BTL owners are rich. Quite the opposite actually as if they were they wouldn't need thhe BTL mortgage to begin with. The idea that you can have a mortgage on a home and rent it out in order to not actually pay that mortgage yourself and still make a profit out of it is outrageous. If a property is mortgaged via BTL you should not be able to massively profit from rents charged. The property itself is the profit/gain here by the owner not having paid the mortgage payments.

To suggest the OP is morally wrong to stay in a secure tenancy provided by a local authority (as is her right) is just as stupid as to say BTL mortgages haven't massively contributed to the current private rental market.

*market rent crisis

Agree with this. Also, top up benefits pay the rent set by these private landlords. So, state money is paying off their investment portfolio. It's costing us all £28bn a year. That's £280bn over ten years. Over a quarter of a trillion pounds of state money we've just given away for nothing. The state has no assets, nothing to show in return. It is absolute madness.

There's a shortage of social housing and I don't understand how it's justifiable that the state pays for OP to stay in a house that is larger than their needs, when other families are struggling. Its not like the OP has earnt it or has any right for it.

The OP has agency and could move out but chooses not to. It's not the government's responsibility to ensure that people behave in a moral way.

Your family should stay out if it. But I agree that you should downsize, it's social housing and other people are in more need of a three bed house than you are.

And as for waiting years for a flat to come up. Just do I direct swap with the family moving into the house.

Why should she?? She may want a family. She should stay.

The Government is in charge of housing policy. We have a shortage of housing. This is for a number of reasons: people staying in larger houses they don’t need, people not buying houses when they could in order to free up HA properties, not building enough homes for rent or ownership, allowing some people to have multiple homes - and that includes divorced or separated people, and immigration. It’s a total mess. Basically we don’t have a housing policy so people grab what they can. Benefits, housing etc. All paid for by others. I guess we just have to put up with it. The OPs not moving anywhere.

Define "need."

I know you're one of the ones who thinks a guest room and a hobby room are a "need".
But I will go with what the government says we need for my DHs visa.

Its not like the OP has earnt it or has any right for it.

She definitely has a bomb-proof right to it - see Part IV Housing Act 1985.

And if you mean that only people who have "earnt" their home, by getting it in return for their own work, are entitled to live there, then a lot of us who have inherited homes are going to be on the street. Including the entire Windsor family.

That says maximum amount of people. I don't think under occupying is in what you've uploaded.

Yes, it's the statutory definition of overcrowding - used in immigration law to make sure new visa arrivals are not being crammed into cubbyholes.

No, it shows the amount of space the government thinks we "need".

Yes exactly! OP is young and will very likely need the extra rooms later on in her life. Maybe not that far down the line.