Student Nurse with a mortgage and no income ...

NOVASTAR

I have a couple of dear friends, one of which after 20 years in the same job since leaving school; has finally been accepted to Nursing College.

This is a three year course and hopefully they will be granted a bursary which I believe is somewhere in the region of £6k.

As they have a joint mortgage and the one who will continue working is earning over £17k, will the student nurse have any claim on housing benefit or council tax – or is it just case of the working person having to support the student?

Thank you in advance for all answers!

charis18uk

NOVASTAR wrote: »

I have a couple of dear friends, one of which after 20 years in the same job since leaving school; has finally been accepted to Nursing College.

This is a three year course and hopefully they will be granted a bursary which I believe is somewhere in the region of £6k.

As they have a joint mortgage and the one who will continue working is earning over £17k, will the student nurse have any claim on housing benefit or council tax – or is it just case of the working person having to support the student?

Thank you in advance for all answers!

Hi, I'm a third year nursing student and can say with absolute certainty that there is little your friend can claim in the ways of benefits.

If the earner is the student nurses partner (whether married or not) then their income will be assessed jointly.

For child tax/working tax purposes (if this is relevant) the bursary is NOT classed as income and will not be taken into account for any assessment of their finances in relation to receiving tax credits.

For council tax the student nurse is not classed as working and if the working partner is the only other adult in the household you can apply for a 25% rebate on the council tax bill for the duration of the course.

As I said I am also a nursing student and also have a working partner living with me and I also have a mortgage so I'm 100% sure of this information.

Hope she enjoys the course.

dmg24

It is not possible to claim housing benefit for a mortgage.

As a student, your friend will be exempt from council tax. Therefore, as a household they will be able to claim a single person discount of their council tax bill.

Best of luck to your friend, it will be worth it in the end! x

DrFluffy

charis18uk wrote: »

If the earner is the student nurses partner (whether married or not) then their income will be assessed jointly.

Depends on their living arrangements - if you can prove you live financially independent lives (providing you are not married or in a civil partnership), then they do not take your partner's income in to account (thankfully!!!).

charis18uk

DrFluffy wrote: »

Depends on their living arrangements - if you can prove you live financially independent lives (providing you are not married or in a civil partnership), then they do not take your partner's income in to account (thankfully!!!).

You can argue your financially independent from each other. You can show separate bank accounts the works. If you are co-habiting whether in a civil partnership or not, married or not it is irrelevant.

The only way the other persons income would not be taken into consideration is if they were two separate individual people, say two friends, with no 'relationship' who had decided to take a mortgage out together.

I think having a mortgage together is going to make it impossible to prove your not financially linked.

Also, if you tried to make out you weren't in a relationship when you were and that you weren't financially linked and you were in order to claim money you were not entitled to then your on seriously dodgy ground.

Besides the fact that fraud is illegal and you could go to jail, any nursing student or nurse for that matter who was charged for such an offence would risk being struck off by the NMC.

DrFluffy

No it isn't - my partner is a lawyer, looked into it fully, even cheked with our LEA, and they told him he was indeed correct...

It's not fraud, there's no legal basis to the relationship.

MLC

I have a friend who has just finished an NHS funded course and claimed independence from their partner even though they have a mortgage together. They are just friends and have bought a house together (honest). Loads of friends buy houses together these days and no one could ever prove otherwise. If you declare your partners income as a partners income you will loose out big time. All of the support calculations are based on you being able to live on peanuts, it’s a joke. Has s/he thought about a career development loan?

dmg24

This discussion of independence may be irrelevant ... it will only make a difference if the OP's friend has children!

tr3mor

Like others have said you'll get a 25% reduction in your council tax. And you'll get all the student loans if you want to take them.

Also - for crying out loud, Comic Sans is not a good font! :mad:

dmg24

Also - for crying out loud, Comic Sans is not a good font! :mad:

No! Comic Sans is my favouritest favouritest font ... but then I am a wanabee teacher (complete with fantastic grammar)! x

NOVASTAR

Dear All
Many thanks for all your helpful replies. I will relay these to my friends. Oh and tr3mor - in fear of upsetting you further - please note the normal font!!!