Good luck to Enfield council

[joe_bloggs*]

Pushed into a corner by soaring prices, greedy landlords and a cap on benefits, one London council has embarked on a daring set of untested policies to provide more public housing

The parks department once used Bury Street West as a store for lawnmowers and to wash out wheelie bins. Soon it will form part of the council’s first programme of housebuilding for 30 years.

Enfield  is funding the developments itself, holding on to the land, and retaining control of all building. And it’s doing this by, effectively, taking out a socking great mortgage and constructing private homes to rent, which will pay for its new council homes. As with the properties it’s buying, the stock will be owned by the council through a new company – which is not legally obliged to offer the right to buy.

http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/sep/01/enfield-experiment-housing-problem-radical-solution

Hopefully it works giving tenants some security as well as bringing down the housing benefit bill

[upthecreekyetagain]

Sounds like an excellent scheme.

Enfield are buying at market prices properties that were originally sold under 'right to buy' which demonstrates everything that is wrong with that scheme.

[aernethril]

This bit is very interesting

http://www.northlondon-today.co.uk/News.cfm?id=24598&headline=Landlord%20starts%20legal%20fight%20ov...

It's long overdue and not only the landlords need to be forced to comply with law, the letting agents are out of control with their extra fees that are all non-refundable.

They charge prospective tenants £250 just for a credit search and then there are admin fees varying from £50 upwards just to process the fact that they're looking for somewhere to rent and want to register.

My son was once provided with his own "flat" in a HMO (House of multiple occupancy) and this 'flat' was less than 8ft long by 6ft wide - just enough room for a single bed, a narrow child's wardrobe and a small chest of drawers.  He had to stand sideways with the bed behind him to get dressed.

And the shared facilities were often a filthy mess - and the Council were paying the landlord over £90 a week for this whilst my son was waiting for help with his life.

There were 4 'flat's like this, and a further 3 larger flats which qualified for double occupancy - ie they contained a double bed, so the tenants were charged more.

Councils should have the right to force private landlords to be licenced as fit for providing adquate accommodation and if they don't comply, they will have to find tenants who can afford to pay their own way - which should mean that they will have to improve to get those tentants anyway.

I can only hope that the renting bubble bursts with a very messy sludge over the private landlords that are forcing rents through the roof - there's only so much that people can afford.

Here, rents have gone up by over 10% in less than 6 months and they're still trying to push them higher and higher.