UC housing costs and renting from a relative

SevenChakras

My dad has a house that I will be renting from him soon. This is a property he rents out and he does not live there. I will be claiming the housing costs element of Universal Credit. We have read up about this and renting a house from a close relative. Does anyone have experience of this? We want to do this officially and make sure we are meeting all the rules of renting from a relative. We will have an official tenancy agreement. Is there anything else anyone can advise us to do?

Ref44

Will you be paying a commercial rent to avoid allegations of a contrived tenancy?

tacpot12

Your father needs to take on all the responsibilities of a landlord, including protecting any tenancy deposit. Not paying a tenancy deposit runs the risk of the DWP considering it a contrived tenancy.

Done properly there is no reason why you should be able to receive the UC Housing Element to help with your rent.

elsien

You must be paying a proper commercial rent.
It will help if your father has previously let out the property.
He needs to show that he is doing everything at the landlord would do for someone else -Taking a protecting the deposit, completing all the obligatory checks such as fire alarms etc, 
You might also need to show why you are moving there rather than staying where you are?

One of the main questions the DWP would be asking is whether he would evict you if the rent was not paid?

this covers the relevant regulations in more detail.
https://www.housingrights.org.uk/professionals/news/universal-credit-decisions-contrived-tenancies

SevenChakras

Ref44 said:

Will you be paying a commercial rent to avoid allegations of a contrived tenancy?

Yes, this is all above board and we want to ensure UC have everything they need to show this.

SevenChakras

tacpot12 said:

Your father needs to take on all the responsibilities of a landlord, including protecting any tenancy deposit. Not paying a tenancy deposit runs the risk of the DWP considering it a contrived tenancy.

Done properly there is no reason why you should be able to receive the UC Housing Element to help with your rent.

Thank you. My dad has been a landlord for many years, so will be treating me the same as every other tenant he has had. It's helpful to know the DWP will require me to pay a deposit and for my dad to protect it.

SevenChakras

elsien said:

You must be paying a proper commercial rent.
It will help if your father has previously let out the property.
He needs to show that he is doing everything at the landlord would do for someone else -Taking a protecting the deposit, completing all the obligatory checks such as fire alarms etc, 
You might also need to show why you are moving there rather than staying where you are?

One of the main questions the DWP would be asking is whether he would evict you if the rent was not paid?

this covers the relevant regulations in more detail.
https://www.housingrights.org.uk/professionals/news/universal-credit-decisions-contrived-tenancies

Thank you for your reply. We did read this about the DWP checking that he would evict me if I was not paying the rent. The link is very helpful, thank you, I will take a look at that.