Desparate

macman

Grumpy_chap said:

Exodi said:

Alan_Fisburn said:

My house rent is £900 per month!!! Plus power, council tax, water etc. We were forced to move into this house as no cheaper ones were available owing to the shortage of rental property in UK.. We had travelled all over England for three months looking for somewhere to stay and found nothing. 

Oh behave, rental properties in the South (the most expensive part of the UK) are around £900 per month.

You only need to drive for a few hours to get the midlands upwards and you'll find the houses are about half that.

You wouldn't get anything where we are as low as £900 - two bed flat from £1250

I don't know where you are, but if you do a Rightmove search on 2 b/r flats in say, Coventry, (approx centre of England) with a 40 mile search radius (the largest range you can specify), and max £600pm, there are 130 such flats. Plenty at around £430 too.
Repeat that search further north and there will be thousands to choose from.
More likely the OP had problems renting because he has no UK credit history and no recent UK references?

elsien

macman said:

Grumpy_chap said:

Exodi said:

Alan_Fisburn said:

My house rent is £900 per month!!! Plus power, council tax, water etc. We were forced to move into this house as no cheaper ones were available owing to the shortage of rental property in UK.. We had travelled all over England for three months looking for somewhere to stay and found nothing. 

Oh behave, rental properties in the South (the most expensive part of the UK) are around £900 per month.

You only need to drive for a few hours to get the midlands upwards and you'll find the houses are about half that.

You wouldn't get anything where we are as low as £900 - two bed flat from £1250

I don't know where you are, but if you do a Rightmove search on 2 b/r flats in say, Coventry, (approx centre of England) with a 40 mile search radius (the largest range you can specify), and max £600pm, there are 130 such flats. Plenty at around £430 too.
Repeat that search further north and there will be thousands to choose from.
More likely the OP had problems renting because he has no UK credit history and no recent UK references?

 I agree that seems more likely. And potentially limited funds for a deposit, reliant on benefits and no guarantor. There's a large proportion of landlords likely to say no already. 

woolly_wombat

OP please don’t be put off by the tone of some of the comments you have encountered on here.

I am very sorry things didn’t work out for you in SA despite your best endeavours. My late mother was involved years back in assisting people who had returned to the UK from East Africa and found themselves in severe financial hardship. Are there any associations or networks of former South African residents that you can plug in to for moral support, friendship and possible assistance?

Someone suggested contacting the CAB (which by the way stands for Citizens Advice Bureau). That’s actually a very good place to start as the benefits system in the UK has become incredibly complex, but they will be able to give you some much needed help to find your way through the benefits maze.

Good luck.

german_keeper

Troytempest said:

The original thread was closed as it went way off track and was going down the North v South debate......

No it wasn't. I made a light hearted comment based on a news story at the time. The thread moved on, nobody responded to my comment, and there was no indication whatsoever of a "North v South debate".

Anyway I will leave it at that as I have no wish to derail things further. With hindsight such a frivolous comment wasn't really appropriate on a thread discussing serious issues. So I apologise wholeheartedly to Alan for my flippancy and hope that he finds some solutions to his problem.

p00hsticks

macman said:

Grumpy_chap said:

Exodi said:

Alan_Fisburn said:

My house rent is £900 per month!!! Plus power, council tax, water etc. We were forced to move into this house as no cheaper ones were available owing to the shortage of rental property in UK.. We had travelled all over England for three months looking for somewhere to stay and found nothing. 

Oh behave, rental properties in the South (the most expensive part of the UK) are around £900 per month.

You only need to drive for a few hours to get the midlands upwards and you'll find the houses are about half that.

You wouldn't get anything where we are as low as £900 - two bed flat from £1250

I don't know where you are, but if you do a Rightmove search on 2 b/r flats in say, Coventry, (approx centre of England) with a 40 mile search radius (the largest range you can specify), and max £600pm, there are 130 such flats. Plenty at around £430 too.
Repeat that search further north and there will be thousands to choose from.
More likely the OP had problems renting because he has no UK credit history and no recent UK references?

Also I think the OP said that originally they had three small dogs (but apparently not any longer) 

Grumpy_chap

macman said:

Grumpy_chap said:

Exodi said:

Alan_Fisburn said:

My house rent is £900 per month!!! Plus power, council tax, water etc. We were forced to move into this house as no cheaper ones were available owing to the shortage of rental property in UK.. We had travelled all over England for three months looking for somewhere to stay and found nothing. 

Oh behave, rental properties in the South (the most expensive part of the UK) are around £900 per month.

You only need to drive for a few hours to get the midlands upwards and you'll find the houses are about half that.

You wouldn't get anything where we are as low as £900 - two bed flat from £1250

I don't know where you are, but if you do a Rightmove search on 2 b/r flats in say, Coventry, (approx centre of England) with a 40 mile search radius (the largest range you can specify), and max £600pm, there are 130 such flats. Plenty at around £430 too.
Repeat that search further north and there will be thousands to choose from.
More likely the OP had problems renting because he has no UK credit history and no recent UK references?

That's amazing!  I'd be well off if I move

Probably the lack of UK history will have been significant, as you said.

p00hsticks

macman said:

Grumpy_chap said:

Exodi said:

Alan_Fisburn said:

My house rent is £900 per month!!! Plus power, council tax, water etc. We were forced to move into this house as no cheaper ones were available owing to the shortage of rental property in UK.. We had travelled all over England for three months looking for somewhere to stay and found nothing. 

Oh behave, rental properties in the South (the most expensive part of the UK) are around £900 per month.

You only need to drive for a few hours to get the midlands upwards and you'll find the houses are about half that.

You wouldn't get anything where we are as low as £900 - two bed flat from £1250

I don't know where you are, but if you do a Rightmove search on 2 b/r flats in say, Coventry, (approx centre of England) with a 40 mile search radius (the largest range you can specify), and max £600pm, there are 130 such flats. Plenty at around £430 too.
Repeat that search further north and there will be thousands to choose from.
More likely the OP had problems renting because he has no UK credit history and no recent UK references?

I think, as others have said, the OP isn't helping us help them by not responding to questions we are asking. We know they are 75, but he refers to a wife and has mentioned a Universal credit claim so she is presumably at least ten years younger than them. But despite asking we don't know any details about them, whether they are able to work, looking for work, working etc. 

That could have an impact on what help is available, and also possibly affect where they can live (if in a job) and how big their accommodation needs to be - but at the moment it's all guesswork. 

nigelbb

The OP states he is 75 & receives +/- £146/month pension. If he had been prudent enough (or even knew it was possible) he could have paid voluntary National Insurance contributions to maximise his UK state pension after leaving the UK. He is ten years post state retirement age so would only have qualified for the old basic pension currently £141.85/week although this could have been increased by deferring actually taking the pension. 

Alan_Fisburn

Hello there. Some more info: My wife is 65 and has now found a job as a carer. However I don't see her working forever at that job. When we came over we started at the South Coast and came up through the centre of England. We know about Rightmove etc. We tried all of them many times. Sometimes we were number 35 in the queue. Sometimes they would not even take on our enquiry. When we were going to look at places there was often a line of cars down the street, all waiting for their turn to see it. I admit that my 3 small dogs did not help and because of them we were looking for a house not a flat. Also, you could not just take any house. If we got an appt. to view it was clear that we were seeing the bottom of the barrel. Some of them I wouldn't have put a pig to live in. One place had the worst crime rate in the county and the youths were smashing windscreens and burning cars every night. I have bad knees and battle to get up and down stairs so we really wanted a bungalow. (although we would have taken anything in the end) Eventually we got a place in North Shropshire but I had to put down a years rent in advance plus another 2 months which completely cleaned me out. I am happy to be in Shropshire though. I have many happy childhood memories from here. Although I am from Liverpool my dad was in the RA and was stationed here in the war, I suppose manning the ack ack on the flight paths to Manchester and Liverpool. He made many friends who we used to come visit for many years afterwards.  He eventually went off to Norway.
Anyway the dogs are now gone. (my wife, who always knows best says I must put that the dogs are now deceased in case somebody thinks we just let them loose in the street)
We have contacted CAB and UK Aged plus anywhere else I can think of but to no avail.
Incidentally I know I should have done this and done that but I didn't!  Also I had a reasonably successful business for most of 41 years which collapsed for reasons beyond my control. I do not enjoy coming cap in hand to the UK Gov although I always wanted come back to UK to die.. (sorry, sounds morbid!) If you had asked me at any time in my life if I would end up in this situation I would have laughed at you. Even now I can hardly believe it!!!!

Pollycat

Will your wife be entitled to any UK state pension when she reaches state pension age?
When is your wife 66? (that is the UK state pension age)

You may be eligible to apply for pension credit when your wife reaches state pension age.

You can read more here:
Pension Credit: Overview - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)


You may wish to ask re eligibility to pension credit on this board:
Benefits & tax credits — MoneySavingExpert Forum

Get help discovering which benefits you are entitled to - and how to claim them.