Changes to Housing benefit how much will rents fall?

chewmylegoff

Jowo wrote: »

"Up to 82,000 households could lose their homes because of changes to housing benefit rules, it was claimed today.

A survey of private landlords by London Councils found that 60 per cent would refuse to lower rent so their tenants could stay on. Many said they would rather evict the tenants or refuse to renew the tenancy when it came to an end...

More than 25 per cent of landlords said they could just decrease the number of properties they rented to tenants on benefits...."

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23880859-housing-benefits-shake-up-will-force-tenants-onto-streets.do

london councils' own figures suggest that only 18,500 odd households will be affected by the caps, so it is difficult to follow their logic that 82,000 households could lose their homes.

sounds like very crude maths to me. probably the number of properties receiving LHA multiplied by the percentage of landlords who claim in this survey they would not reduce their rent.

such claims are unrealistic - if 82,000 more houses become available, then rents are going to come down, it's just a choice of whether you accept: (i) the lower rent from an LHA claimant, (ii) the lower rent from a non LHA claimant or (iii) a void (the lowest rent possible.

Silverbull

With the £500wk benefit cap coming in, £400wk housing benefit seems a lot.

How will this affect London? Either 2 options I can see.

1. Rents fall a long way.

2. Unless you earn a very good wage you will have to move out of London.

Either way rents and then house prices will fall a long way in London.

It will probably be a bit of 1 and 2.

the_flying_pig

Silverbull wrote: »

With the £500wk benefit cap coming in, £400wk housing benefit seems a lot.

How will this affect London?...

I'd wondered this.

We'll see, I suppose.

chucky

Silverbull wrote: »

With the £500wk benefit cap coming in, £400wk housing benefit seems a lot.

How will this affect London? Either 2 options I can see.

1. Rents fall a long way.

2. Unless you earn a very good wage you will have to move out of London.

Either way rents and then house prices will fall a long way in London.

It will probably be a bit of 1 and 2.

if these people move out of London where are these people going to all work?

ukcarper

They could move to smaller houses

chucky

ukcarper wrote: »

They could move to smaller houses

unfortunately that isn't part of the HPC mantra - they will move put of London to live in Wales because there are better employment opportunities there than in London.

drc

chucky wrote: »

if these people move out of London where are these people going to all work?

If they work, can they not commute into London like so many other people do? There are trains that go from the home counties into London. Might also mean that employers will raise the salaries of workers who cannot afford to live in London anymore?

Silverbull

chucky wrote: »

unfortunately that isn't part of the HPC mantra - they will move put of London to live in Wales because there are better employment opportunities there than in London.

Chucky what do you think will happen to those families getting up to £4500 week to pay their rent?

I know these are extreme cases but there are plenty getting about £2000 wk.

Maybe Chucky is right and they will just move to smaller houses and everything will be fine?

chucky

drc wrote: »

If they work, can they not commute into London like so many other people do? There are trains that go from the home counties into London. Might also mean that employers will raise the salaries of workers who cannot afford to live in London anymore?

that's exactly right or move to smaller houses.

there is only so far you can move away to commute in to London - you can't move out too far from London, trains can be very expensive and it would probably end up cheaper staying in the more expensive accomodation or even smaller property. using the London Transport network is much cheaper.

carolt

Interesting stuff on this here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/04/benefit-cuts-population-movements