The biggest housing association in Chester claims it is bucking the national trend by reducing the number of evictions at their properties due to rent arrears.
The government has recently announced it is to launch a working group to look into concerns that some housing associations are too quick to evict tenants. Chester & District Housing Trust (CDHT) has announced its’ lowest ever number of evictions.
Numbers have fallen from 75 evictions in 2000 to 21 for the end of this financial year. CDHT has gone to great lengths to avoid evictions, in some cases intervening in Court hearings.
By using its new customer profiling survey information, CDHT found that 80 percent of evictions were single males living in flats with an average age of 35. Customer profiling has helped identify residents who were most vulnerable to eviction and enabled the Trust to best support them by tailoring its approach to rent collection and debt prevention.
Last week CDHT prevented another eviction. A resident, who had previously ignored all attempts to contact her, was finally persuaded to contact CDHT by a family member who had been contacted by the evicting officer on the morning of the eviction. Once CDHT had spoken to the resident directly, the team were able to discuss her financial difficulties, advise her of help available, come to a repayment arrangement and stop her going to a doorstep lender for a high interest loan. Due to the time pressures, the CDHT team offered to pick her up and drove her to Chester County Court to agree the suspension of the eviction.
Although CDHT has made a conscious decision with its customers not to use this legal rule, housing associations and private landlords do have the power to evict tenants in arrears of more than two months rent, even if they were due to delays in processing their claims.
Paul Knight, Executive Manager Performance and Income, said: “This reduction in the number of evictions has a positive impact upon our collection rates and our re-let times, as well as having a positive social impact by keeping residents in their homes. Last year the Trust evicted 21 residents. This represents a significant reduction over the last three years when there was more than twice this number of evictions.”
By analysing the average cost of an eviction during 2007/08, which is £4,848 in rent loss and repair costs alone, CDHT has found that significant savings can be made with an effective approach to their prevention.
CDHT provides targeted advice for residents at and prior to sign up, including a benefit health check, financial advice and referral services available and promotion of Chester Credit Union, concerning savings and low cost loans.
Survey results have shown that single residents were most in need of financial advice and referral systems were established with three local agencies Citizen Advice Bureau, Consumer Credit Counselling Service and a specialist solicitor, offering a choice to residents.
