Very low income, but own houses. Do I get benefit

krisskross

I take your point about lifestyle of people who claim benefits e.g smokers, drinkers etc. There are a lot of people who feel benefits should be paid as vouchers, food, utility etc but a lot of other people who feel a system like this would be demeaning.

Do you have mortgages on the properties? Do you get child tax credit? These could be other areas to explore.

Anarchist

But you think its right that I have to pay for you to live, when I have no property, no savings and only really scrape by, yet you have tens of thousands of equity saved up? I won't even get into the discussion of buy-to-lets taking houses off people who want to buy, but can't now because of them all being bought to let and pushing the prices up tens of thousands.

I agree it is a little grey, but there is still a massive difference between selling a house that you only have to rent out (you aren't just making the £3000 gross, but you are also raising your equity in the property by several thousands) and selling cars/jewellery worth a fraction of that - and cars are essential living items that devalue over time/use.

I agree with £20 a day fag/drink habits and £50 sky subscriptions, they shouldn't be able to do this if not on their own contribution based benefits.

Apple_2

Garysletters

Can I ask a different question ? When you claimed the 6 months JSA contribs based, how did the btl rentals affect it ? Did you disclose them or was the fact you made no net profit the deciding factor in their decision ? Reason I'm asking is I've got a friend in exactly the same position. She's about to be made redundant but isn't going to claim the JSA because she thought the property rents thing meant she couldn't ? Is she wrong - she'll ( I think ) be able to demonstrate a net loss on them.

healy

Dear Apple,

If it is contribution based JSA your friend is claiming she is entitled to it despite any property rents received.

callansdad

How many properties do you own? What is the rate of rent you are charging and how much of outstanding mortgage have you got on them and how much are you paying monthly for the mortgages?

Have you thought about raising the rent slightly on your properties, it may not help a lot but every little counts. Another avenue to explore would be to remortgage them for a better deal if this can be done. I used to rent out a property and when it came to the crunch i had to sell it and the flat that i lived in to buy a bigger house for my family. It was well worth it in the end, i needed to release the equity to pay a deposit and so i could take out a larger mortgage.

You need to juggle your finances and take a long hard think if you are struggling that badly. If you are not claiming working tax/child tax then do so now. Apart from that there will be nothing else that i can think of that you would be entitled to because of your properties being classed as savings. You could maybe sell the home you are in now and buy a smaller one, if this saves you money?

lil_me

If your partner is working depending on income/hours would be able to claim WTC, which will be as a family.

Ross01

You can get JSA(contribution) as it is based on the amount of National Insurance contributions you have paid as is not means tested. However it runs out after 26 weeks. Regarding the property if once the mortgage has been deducted the property is still worth more than 16 thousand then its tough, you can not claim.

achtunglady

Ross01 wrote:

You can get JSA(contribution) as it is based on the amount of National Insurance contributions you have paid as is not means tested. However it runs out after 26 weeks. Regarding the property if once the mortgage has been deducted the property is still worth more than 16 thousand then its tough, you can not claim.

But will he be entitled to it as he lives with his girlfriend who works???

If he can, then how come a married woman who has worked, paid contributions, stopped working to have a child, cannot claim because "your husband works he can support you????"

sammyjammy

You're right Achtunglady if his girlfriend is working full time then he wouldn't be entitled to any means tested benefits, FWIW if he only owned one house and they were living in it it wouldn't matter how much equity was in it he would be able to claim means tested benefits if neither were working.