Housing benefit

Hello,
Please I have a client who is on pension credit. She submit a HB application and it was unsuccessful.
The issue is she used to owned the property but could not afford the mortgage. So the property was transferred or bought by her son in-law. Her son in- law let the property out and the rent was over £625 a month.
She has been paying £400 a month by standing order and £200 by cash.
The son in-law has issued a section 8 for her to leave the property.
She is very stressed and will like some advice.
Has anyone dealt with something like this or has ant tips.
Thanks

Yes I have. What advice is she after? Is she looking to appeal the decision? You don’t say…..

You need to be looking at reg. 9 of the HB (persons who have attained the qualifying age for state pension credit) Regulations 2006. The exclusions set out in that regulation are for present purposes the same as in reg. 9 of the standard HB regs. If you have a copy of Findlay (and as a Law Centre, you ought to) take a look at the commentary to reg. 9 of the standard regs.

Without you specifying the basis of the LA’s decision one cannot be certain - but it’s likely it’s decided either;

-  the tenancy is either ‘not on a commercial basis’ (reg. 9 (a))
- or that she is excluded because she previously owned the property and less than 5 years have elapsed since she ceased to own it (reg. 9 (h)) - but note that should not apply if she can satisfy the LA (or a tribunal on appeal) that she could not continue to occupy the property without selling up.
- or that the liability was created to take advantage of the HB scheme (reg. 9 (l))

Depending on the facts, the last of these might be the most problematic. It needs to be borne in mind that the purpose of the HB scheme is to allow a person to pay rent and to continue to occupy their home. It is not to enable a person (or their very close relative) to purchase a property outright - that policy intent is reflected in the loans for mortgage interest payments for home owners (and the mortgage interest payments that preceded the more recent scheme) - if you’re a homeowner on means-tested benefits, help is available to pay the interest on a mortgage (which generally enables a person to avoid repossession) but not to actually pay off the capital sum. If what the son is charging your client (what he therefore hopes HB will pay) is a figure which not only allows the interest payments on the mortgage to be paid, but also covers the capital repayments there may well be an issue there…...

ETA: on that last point, it shouldn’t be read as my saying that the liability will always have been created to take advantage of the HB scheme in this sort of scenario - these things are always fact sensitive.

- where someone has been paying the rent to their family member landlord for some time and from their own resources before their circumstances changed and they needed to claim HB, that would point to the liability not being created to take advantage of the HB scheme.

- conversely, if it was never going to be possible to pay the rent without HB, that might be point in the other direction.