Shared ownership rent arrears - what are my rights?

gazfocus

My first house was a shared ownership house and I would not recommend it to anyone. I wish I'd bought a 100% of a smaller/older house for the same amount as we paid for 50% of a newer house.

The reason the HA will be informing your mortgage lender is that it will be written in your lease that should you fall into arrears, the HA can ask the mortgage lender to pay the arrears and add it to your mortgage balance - it's very unlikely that the mortgage lender will agree but it's there to stop the HA repossessing the house without the mortgage lender losing their money.

I fell into rent arrears with my shared ownership house before I sold it and my mortgage lender actually helped me to negotiate payments with the HA so it's not all bad if the mortgage lender get involved.

If you don't want to speak to StepChange, I would contact the HA, in writing, and supply them with a breakdown of your income and outgoings illustrating that £50 is all you can realistically afford.

If you do speak to StepChange, they can be extremely helpful as they will have way more clout with the HA than you alone but as others have said, they can help refocus your finances to where they need to be spent. They may also suggest a breathing space application which will prevent the HA from hounding you until the breathing space expires.

EssexHebridean

Even in a standard leasehold property, arrears (in that case, of the service charge) can lead to a contact being made with the mortgage company - it rarely happens, and is mostly used as a threat, but it can happen. 

On the arrears, as a starting point and so that you can feel you are proactively doing “something” I’d make my first step putting together the SOA (statement of affairs) that we point people posting over on the debt free wannabe board towards - the link is in my signature. This firstly means that you can see all your income and expenditure in one place which can be really helpful. Once you have completed it - what does it say -  “should” you have money left at the end of each month? If so then step one is to work out why you currently don’t have. Are you spending in areas that you’ve forgotten about? Underestimating your grocery bills? Is there oddd amounts of frittering going on that you’ve simply not identified?  If the figure at the end is a negative, then you need to go through every line as a starting point to think through what can be reduced - that might be by haggling prices of renewing contracts, having a think about how you can spend less on shopping, or even cancelling services you’re not utilising fully for example. It’s a rare SOA where there aren’t some savings to be made, however. 

You can also choose the “format for MSE” option at the end, and then copy and paste that into a new threat on the Debt Free Wannabe board (not here) and we can take a look and see what suggestions we can make. 

It’s highly unlikely you are going to lose your home, be reassured about that. It’s also entirely fixable as a situation - this is a dot in the ocean in terms of debt even though it feels insurmountable to you right now  - I promise you it’s not though. 

RAS

Do you have any consumer debt that you are paying? Or anything you can sell?

Medium term, can you get a few hour's employment without affecting your other benefit rights, rather than being self employed?

theartfullodger

You have the right to attempt to defend yourself if Housing Association takes you to court to evict you .

Not a position I'd want to be in.

silvercar

The housing association could right to the mortgage lender and say they are considering starting steps to repossession. The lender then would be within their rights to pay off your rent arrears and add that amount to your mortgage + some admin charges. They can do this because they have a right to defend their security ie the charge they took on the property when they gave you a mortgage. 

The lender would then try to come to an arrangement with you to pay this amount off. I don’t know how willing they would be to negotiate. Best case would be they consider it a further advance on the mortgage and allow you to pay it off across the full term of the mortgage, worst case is that they demand you repay it immediately. Most likely is that they agree with you a repayment plan, be that 6 months, 1 year or 2 years.

macman

charlotteb83 said:

So despite the fact I agreed with the original person at the HA to overpay to clear the arrears, because they have now decided they want more than the agreed amount I can now be evicted? I was under the impression I couldn’t be evicted from a house I part own? And as I said it’s not like ive completely stopped paying the rent I pay every month, and I’m paying extra to clear the arrears 

Where do you get 'eviction' from? That would be a very long way down the line and is the last thing any HA or lender wants to do. They have simply asked you to increase the repayment of the arrears.
Under shared ownership, it would be repossession rather than eviction, but your tenancy agreement should make it clear what the process would be.
Can you take in a lodger? That would instantly give you up to £7.5k of income pa tax free.