The changing nature of housing advice in a post Covid world.

The last three months have seen the issues we are dealing with in the housing team change from three months prior to coronavirus. Three months prior to COVID the top 3 issues were:
  1. Local Authority Housing
  2. Threatened homelessness
  3. Actual homelessness
During the COVID Period we have seen less clients, however the top 3 issues that have occurred are:
  1. Private rented sector issues
  2. Actual homelessness
  3. Threatened homelessness & access & provision to accommodation

What we think this is showing?

Private landlords have been
  • trying to end tenancies when they shouldn’t have been,
  • haven’t been following the government guidelines around coronavirus and housing
  • and their tenants have had problems paying the full rent leading to rent arrears.
Interestingly, Threatened Homelessness has not reduced in the period and one can assume it will increase during the next 3 months. Additionally, actual homeless is still a problem but there seems to be less issues with the local authority and their response. This could be linked to the government guidelines with the council and that no homelessness decisions seem to be being made at the moment.