Housing benefit, renting from my Mum

DX2

Sam___ wrote: »

The question is though if the mother wasn't renting to them would she be renting to someone else? as she was renting it out before they moved in then the answer would surely be yes...

On the 1st April 2010, myself, my girlfriend and her child moved into the house, my mother moved out and went to live at her parents.

Family move in to pay mothers mortgage with housing benefit, from the way I read it.

Jowo_2

RazWaz wrote: »

You can't claim Housing Benefit if renting from a close relative, even if the agreements are all legit.

You can if the landlord and their tenant who is closely related do not live in the same property and the tenancy is set up on a sound commercial basis and isn't contrived (i.e. set up to exploit the HB system, for example where the landlord doesn't charge rent when their tenant is working but does when they are eligible for LHA)

Sam____2

DX2 wrote: »

Family move in to pay mothers mortgage with housing benefit, from the way I read it.

I think I'd agree with that but seems they may be out of luck, they will earn too much to qualify for LHA and they aren't entitled to claim for a 3 bedroom house anyway it would only be at the 2 bed rate

dmg24

Jam0r wrote: »

we pay a rent of £550 a month ...

I work full time and my gf works part time and although we are coping at the moment, having Housing Benefit would help us out a huge amount, our wages aren't exactly anything to shout about. When we first applied for it I believe the system said we could be entitled to around £500 a month, not sure how accurate this is though.

I agree with DX2, irrespective of whether you qualify to claim LHA this amount does not sound accurate. How much do you earn?

Jowo_2

What is you and your partner's gross income each year and how much tax credits (child/working) do you receive?

To the OP - put all your income details into the Turn 2 us website which is an online benefits calculator. The LHA direct website will indicate the maximum LHA payable for the 2 bedroom room rate in your post code which is the size of property your household is eligible for in terms of LHA (a tenant can pick any size and any rental priced property they desire but the LHA direct website caps it according to household size and mix).

Like the others, I doubt that you'd be eligible for LHA approaching 90% of your rental expenses if there are two adults in employment but you could well qualify for some. What does the Turn2us website indicate?

lewt

I don't think there is anyway you'd get near £500 HB a) because you both work and b) the situation with your mother moving out as you moved in sounds like it is dodgy.

MissMoneypenny

I don't know about LHA, but has she received permission from her mortgage lender to let the property? Her insurance will be invalid if she has not. Plus a lot of lenders now are raising the interest rate when they find an anauthorised let.
Has she got an up to date Gas Safety Certificate?
Has she declared the fact that she is receiving rent, to the tax office?

afc80

mother moves out, son moves in, they then try to claim LHA, any council would look at this as contrived to take advantage of the HB scheme.

Mind you there is always the right of appeal, appeals team in LAs often come to a different conclusion than the Benefits Section.

however, as has been said earlier, the current joint income's of the couple would seem to indicate that they would fail to qualify for any help.

sooperb

Something somewhere doesn't sound right! LHA is based on a set of rules to determine entitlement. It shouldn't matter who your landlord is in the first instance, if you are not entitled to LHA then you won't get it. If you are entitled then the landlord is the landlord, what on earth does "contrived" mean in this instance?

My daughter's friend rents from her father who owns the property. When she kicked her husband out (and possibly even before) she applied for and got LHA which we are fairly certain her father gives her some or all of it back!

Whether the rules are different between HB and LHA I really don't know, but to the best of my knowledge, you can rent from a relative. We nearly went down this road with my daughter but she decided not to move so it never happened.

Jowo_2

sooperb wrote: »

Something somewhere doesn't sound right! LHA is based on a set of rules to determine entitlement. It shouldn't matter who your landlord is in the first instance, if you are not entitled to LHA then you won't get it. If you are entitled then the landlord is the landlord, what on earth does "contrived" mean in this instance?

.

It doesn't matter who the landlord is but in the case of it being a close relative, there is a requirement that tenancy is a proper one and not contrived (i.e. set up to exploit the benefits system).

This prevents informal tenancies, ensures that there is a tenancy agreement in place and is designed to prevent the abuse of the HB system.

It would be considered contrived if the OPs mother doesn't charge them rent when they are working but bills them rent or higher rent when they are entitled to LHA.

http://www.ownershipoptions.org.uk/pdf/Buying%20to%20let%20to%20a%20relative.pdf