No DSS when renting.

[El Cid 220]

10 hours ago, catmiss said:

Having worked in housing advice and Social Housing I don’t think benefit claimants are any more likely to accrue rent arrears than other tenants on low incomes. What's different in the private sector is higher rents exceeding HB maximum payments with benefit cuts making payment of any shortfall very difficult. 

But housing benefit was paid to landlords, now with UC its paid to the tenant. Is that correct? It is crazy, its making landlords less likely to rent to social tenants.

[Delbow 701]

10 hours ago, catmiss said:

Having worked in housing advice and Social Housing I don’t think benefit claimants are any more likely to accrue rent arrears than other tenants on low incomes. What's different in the private sector is higher rents exceeding HB maximum payments with benefit cuts making payment of any shortfall very difficult.  With many private landlords reliant on the rent to pay property mortgages or retirement income and the time and costs incurred in eviction proceedings. I understand the sentiment behind the ruling but fear many small time, sometimes the better providers, will leave the sector to impersonal corporate landlords 

I think your fears are probably misplaced. It's the letting agents who tend to have blanket policies like "No DSS", small landlords with one or two properties tend to be more flexible. The solution of course is to build more genuinely affordable housing, which means social housing. The market has been given plenty of time (41 years to be precise) to show that it can build sufficient housing to meet what is a fundamental need at an affordable price and it can't, and that's because it doesn't want to. Simply promising to match housing benefits to private rents doesn't work, as we discovered with Local Housing Allowance, because landlords will just keep putting the rent up.

13 minutes ago, El Cid said:

But housing benefit was paid to landlords, now with UC its paid to the tenant. Is that correct? It is crazy, its making landlords less likely to rent to social tenants.

Yes, the Tories have helped push landlords away from people who need state help to pay the rent (most of whom are working by the way, or were before Covid anyway), thereby increasing the likelihood of them breaking the law. 

[Anna B 1,414]

On 24/04/2019 at 19:25, zach said:

Read what I put!

 

Some of us 

 

Not everyone who gets help with rent, or gets benefits would blow the cash instead of paying their dues. Most landlords just ban everyone who gets Gov help with the "No DSS" line. That is what I don't think is fair.  

Of course not, most want to do the right thing, but the biggest problem is rents are too much and benefits too little.

Benefits won't always cover the whole rent, there's a cap on what will be paid, (a single person for example will often only be granted enough to pay for a single room in a shared house,) and then there are deductions like bedroom tax etc. and landlords want rent in advance and deposits and so on. 

 

And any debt is stopped at source leaving the tenant with not enough to cover all the bills including rent.

 

Tenants are often in debt because of the delay before Universal credit kicks in, this can often be for 2 months or more, so they literally have nothing to live on. They have to borrow money from the council just to get through. When they do eventually get paid, this debt has to be paid back from week one, and is stopped at source from benefit, so straight away they don't have enough to cover the rent and outgoings. This starts off a downward spiral of borrowing just to live and pay bills. You'd be surprised how many people on benefits have to go hungry and still can't meet the demands.

 

People who have no knowledge of benefits have been deliberately mislead by the Conservative government into believing benefits claimants are all feckless wastrels who are spending their benefits down the pub etc. This 'life of Riley idea is false, but has allowed the government to slash benefits and bring in Draconian rules leading to sanctions etc. all under the excuse of 'Austerity.' 

 

With the coming rise in unemployment, more and more people are going to discover for themselves the unfairness and harshness of the system that they voted for and ends with homeless people, and people living on the street. In a supposedly rich and civilised country, that is a disgrace.

 

 

Edited December 20, 2020 by Anna B

[El Cid 220]

9 hours ago, Anna B said:

Of course not, most want to do the right thing, but the biggest problem is rents are too much and benefits too little.

Benefits won't always cover the whole rent, there's a cap on what will be paid, (a single person for example will often only be granted enough to pay for a single room in a shared house,) and then there are deductions like bedroom tax etc. and landlords want rent in advance and deposits and so on.

And of course benefits  should have a limit. There will always be houses that private and housing benefit tenents cannot afford. The problem is the lack of social housing.

My ex wife has been on benefits for over 10 years, she is poor and lives alone, but chooses to pay the bedroom tax because she likes where she lives, there are one bedroom flats close by.

[*_ash_* 88]

13 hours ago, Anna B said:

Of course not, most want to do the right thing, but the biggest problem is rents are too much and benefits too little.

Benefits won't always cover the whole rent, there's a cap on what will be paid, (a single person for example will often only be granted enough to pay for a single room in a shared house,) and then there are deductions like bedroom tax etc. and landlords want rent in advance and deposits and so on. 

 

So they are better off then, than someone who worked until the virus, but has a mortgage.

 

I spoke to a friend last week, and he said his benefit covers his entire rent/CTax and bills (shared house, 2 bathrooms 3 people in total), and he lives off his £409 a month.

 

I lost job, had 6 months mortgage holiday, now back to paying it again. 409 covers my mortgage and  CTax, and nothing else.

 

Doesn't seem to be too bad to me, if you are renting/council property.

 

He's now better off since the virus because they put up UC. I'm living on overdraft.

 

I'd be happy if they extended to mortgage holiday. I can live on the UC without mortgage. I doubt the government would allow the banks to go bust.

[Delbow 701]

3 hours ago, *_ash_* said:

So they are better off then, than someone who worked until the virus, but has a mortgage.

 

I spoke to a friend last week, and he said his benefit covers his entire rent/CTax and bills (shared house, 2 bathrooms 3 people in total), and he lives off his £409 a month.

 

I lost job, had 6 months mortgage holiday, now back to paying it again. 409 covers my mortgage and  CTax, and nothing else.

 

Doesn't seem to be too bad to me, if you are renting/council property.

 

He's now better off since the virus because they put up UC. I'm living on overdraft.

 

I'd be happy if they extended to mortgage holiday. I can live on the UC without mortgage. I doubt the government would allow the banks to go bust.

Mortgage holders used to be able to claim Support for Mortgage Interest after 13 weeks on benefits, but then the last government changed that waiting period to 39 weeks - one of the cuts to benefits that is now hitting people who were oblivious to it before. The government assumes now that ALL mortgage holders will have unemployment/sickness insurance that pays out from day one - a very market-based solution, and one that people need to be aware of. Your friend is wrong by the way - council tax support replaced council tax benefit years ago and no longer covers all of the council tax. 

[Jeffrey Shaw 90]

There was a BBC News item on this, a couple of days ago: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55331081

It states that the majority of adverts on SpareRoom and OpenRent say people on benefits will not be considered as tenants. The rental platforms said they were working to address the issues. In July, a judge ruled that blanket bans on renting properties to benefits claimants are unlawful and discriminatory, breaking the 2010 Equality Act on grounds of sex and disability.

 

[*_ash_* 88]

2 hours ago, Delbow said:

Your friend is wrong by the way

he's wrong about his own finances? Well perhaps. He said the rent is all in.

 

Either way, you are better off now if you were on the dole and in rented property than now.

 

 

[Delbow 701]

5 minutes ago, *_ash_* said:

he's wrong about his own finances? Well perhaps. He said the rent is all in.

 

Either way, you are better off now if you were on the dole and in rented property than now.

 

 

Lots of people don't really understand how their benefits are made up. A very small number of people have their council tax paid by their landlord (usually in a HMO) in which case their council tax is covered. You can also apply to your local council for a Discretionary Housing Payment to cover the shortfall in your council tax support, but as the name suggests there is no entitlement to that, they can turn you down, and it's usually for just a few months at a time. I'm sorry I didn't really understand your last sentence.

[Resident 1,193]

On 20/12/2020 at 18:10, Jeffrey Shaw said:

There was a BBC News item on this, a couple of days ago: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55331081

It states that the majority of adverts on SpareRoom and OpenRent say people on benefits will not be considered as tenants. The rental platforms said they were working to address the issues. In July, a judge ruled that blanket bans on renting properties to benefits claimants are unlawful and discriminatory, breaking the 2010 Equality Act on grounds of sex and disability.

 

RightMove have been allowing the developer of the Skye Edge development to advertise NO DSS/UC recently too