Crisis Loan/Budgetting Loan/Community Care Grant Help?

johnsons_baby

Hello,

Can anyone point me in the right direction please?

I seperated from my ex some time ago due to his ongoing domestic violence, my daught and I managed to break free and after a few months, the council have now offered us a lovely house, which is available at the end of June (just being cleaned and having a new boiler installed).

Unfortunately, my belongings are still with my ex and he won't allow me to have them and actually, he's welcome to them as I wouldn't allow myself to be in a situation where he could hurt me again.

The house is through the local housing association and the council are organising the rent and doing all that and I repay them via my housing benefit I believe, although yet to get finer details.

So, I am wondering, which is the best to apply for a small payment to cover the cost of buying furniture and appliances?

I'm on income support and prior to that I was on JSA (my daughter is 10 months) since Feb. I've got a small amount of money to one side (£300) which I will use for things but I need carpets, curtains, cooker, beds, sofa, I could do without a washer as I can use my Mum's as we'll only be round the corner.

I don't know which of these is best and whether I fulfil criteria for any of them, so any help is appreciated.

Oh, wont be buying brand new, I intend going via ebay or local furniture recycling!

RAS

Hi

Have you spoken to anyone about getting police support to remove your belonging from the old house?

Beyond that

1. Join www.freegle.org.uk or freecycle - like e-bay but you get the stuff for free. I would start looking now and stashing things at mum's.

2. You mention the furniture recycling network. You may need a letter of support from your social worker to get stuff at lower costs. Do ask them.

Can you measure up now, by the way?

johnsons_baby

Thank you RAS!

The police were not much help, they said they are not a removal facility and they did not feel they were able to help.

He's told my solicitor he isn't willing to allow me my possessions, so I can either let it go and move on with my life or spend ages fighting him about it through the civil courts.

Thank you for the links to those 2 sites, I'm off to register.

We're allowed to measure up after the 20th, so only a wee while to wait.

Our furniture recycling scheme only helps those on benefits, which I am on for the time being, and they are very helpful and the items seem to be in a good condition (they say they are picky!) but my basic wishlist is totting up, so I'll look to see what I can get for free or cheaply too.

Thanks again :j

GrungeMeister

You might get a crisis loan for a cooker, perhaps a fridge if you need to store medicines which require refrigeration. That's just about the limit you'll get on a crisis loan unless you can demonstrate some kind of risk to your health or safety by not getting item x, y or z on a crisis loan.

For a community care grant, you need to demonstrate that your family is under exceptional pressure. Having to flee domestic violence and leaving all your stuff behind might qualify you for that, although they might well ask why you can't just request a police presence at your former home while you retrieve all your stuff.

Which leaves a budgeting loan. And you may or may not qualify for that, depending on whether you already owe the Social Fund any money.

Advice above is great, about freegle, freecycle etc. The stuff you can get on there is simply AMAZING, my friend got 3 G Plan chest of drawers on there a few weeks ago, solid teak with the most beautiful dovetail joints ... absolute works of art ... just a bit old fashioned, nobody wanted them. I remember my parents paying a fortune for G Plan in the 1970's.

Same with charity shops, there's no shame in second hand, it's often miles better than you can buy brand new ... same friend got 24 piece set of Denby crockery the other day ... £3.50 for the lot.

Good luck in your new home :-)

mmgmum

Hi you may be best going onto your local job centre and asking which one would be best suited to your situation as some loans from the government you have of been claiming certain benefits for a certain time period before your eligible to them

Freecycle is good or local second hand papers can be good for a bargain too or local carboot for curtains etc..

Other than that some councils do schemes where they help you with carpets and furniture etc and you pay £xxx on top of your rent but some can be quite expensive might be worth it for the carpets if you arnt eligible to a loan as then you can spend the your savings on beds etc..

Hope this helps

johnsons_baby

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Been on freecycle and I managed to gather

2 sofas
Table & 4 chairs
Double bed base
2 rugs

Actually found one person selling this all who was only 5 minutes walk away, so we'll be picking items up tomorrow and storing in Dad's garage.

Made me far more optimistic that I can actually do this without much state financial help, just posted some wanted ads but holding fire on white goods until I've measured the spaces for them.

looby75

Not advice about loans etc as thats pretty much been covered but a suggestion.

I don't know if you have one in your area but British Heart Foundation furniture shops are fantastic for people setting up home.

My brother in law is an unstable epileptic and has broken countless pieces of furniture by falling on them when he fits. They have had some fantastic bargains of really good quality furniture and electrical items from there.

Good luck and I hope you and your daughter will be really happy in your new home

johnsons_baby

We do Looby and I've been in already to have a look, ours seems to have a lot of white goods and they're all tested so I will probably go to them for the white goods.

I did see a nice sideboard there for £30 but at the time my Dad had broke his foot so his car was in the garage otherwise I would have bought it and stored it in the garage.

I'm not fussy about brand new or second hand, I'm just grateful for the opportunity to be able to start over again.

looby75

it's great you have somewhere to store stuff, that way you can get the best of the bargains

missapril75

johnsons_baby wrote: »

Made me far more optimistic that I can actually do this without much state financial help...

Brilliant.

What you describe in your first post, though, is a qualifier for a grant as posted above. Although it's much less difficult to get with some sort of support worker - like women's aid, for example.

Just don't rule out its availability. If you manage to get a cooker, for example, but it packs up 5 months later, it would be highly unlikely you'd get a grant then because the need would be arising for a different reason.

You'd then be looking at a budgeting loan for which the repayments would obviously lower your benefit.

If you did apply for a grant for just a cooker, say, and you included as information you didn't need other things because you managed to sort that out from the resources mentioned, you might find your application is looked upon more favourably and maybe a minimum of fuss.

It puts you in a good light.