People who owe hundreds of pounds in unpaid rent could soon be allowed to search for a new home on Salford’s housing register.
Individuals with rent arrears of more than £200 are currently barred from using Salford Home Search, which lets residents bid online for available properties.
But the council is refreshing its housing allocations policy, and officers are recommending that the cap on arrears is raised so that people owing more can use the system – as long as they have a repayment plan in place.
A report going before next week’s cabinet meeting shows that many of those who responded to a public consultation think the existing cap is too low – arguing that £200 can be reached quickly in a number of weeks.
And some 25 respondents said that a blanket policy on arrears wouldn’t take into account the impact of welfare reform, redundancy, job losses or rent increases – essentially arrears accrued at ‘no fault’ of the tenant.
As of April last year there were nearly 6,000 people registered on the Salford Home Search.
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Overall trends show a significant decrease in the number of properties becoming available and advertised on Salford Home Search generally over time.
The number of properties that were let dropped from 1,616 in 2016, to 1,312 last year.
Meanwhile, the introduction of Universal Credit has also been blamed for pushing people further into rent arrears.
A town hall study from November showed that nearly four in five tenants receiving Universal Credit in City West housing in Salford are in rent arrears, on average £676 per person.
Nevertheless, town hall officers warn that registered providers also have their own allocations policies which will still impact individuals searching on the register.
They say: “Even if Salford city council accepted applicants with higher levels of rent arrears onto the housing register, if they are not complying with a rent repayment plan many registered providers are likely to bypass these cases.”
The terms recommended for discussion in Tuesday’s cabinet meeting say individuals should be able to register if:
They have rent arrears of less than £500 and are able to demonstrate 13 weeks’ engagement with an arrears repayment plan (or engagement from the commencement of the arrears if this is less than 13 weeks).
They have rent arrears of between £500 and £750 and are able to demonstrate at least 19 weeks’ engagement with an arrears repayment plan (or engagement from the commencement of the arrears if this is less than 19 weeks).
Officers say that a new policy would ‘appropriately restrict’ people who have a repeated history of failing to pay their rent – and not ‘engaging with a repayment plan’ – and who are therefore considered to be ‘unsuitable future tenants’.
But they argue it wouldn’t penalise those who have experienced temporary financial difficulties and those who have tried to engage with their landlord to try to pay the arrears off.
They add that the policy would be in line with national guidance which calls for ‘greater priority to be given to applicants who have been model tenants’.
The report does say that respondents to the consultation commented on the fairness of the policy in relation to certain circumstances – such as historical behaviour followed by a subsequent good tenancy history and the impact of mental health problems and learning difficulties.
It adds: “It is noted that landlords (both private and social) endeavour to work with tenants when arrears start to accrue in order to remedy these and try to support tenants. It is in the best interests of landlords to do so as the eviction and re-letting process can be costly and timely.”
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