Should you allow people with housing benefits to rent your property?
Simply, Yes, Yes and Yes to housing benefits.
With a focus on long term management to long term tenants we have some fantastic tenants who are in receipt of financial aid.
The tenants we have are wanting a ‘forever’ home and as such, do all that they can to ensure a tenancy continues, ie keeping to the agreement of the tenancy.
With the aim of staying in the property for many years, people really do become ‘house proud’ and try to keep their home as best they can. This is seen through tenant making an effort to keep the gardens neat and tidy and spending some monies on the property for a new carpet or a bit of painting. All from within a restrained budget.
Now, like all tenancies it can be difficult and there are hurdles like third party discussions with the council but with around 20% of private renters in Scotland being in receipt of housing benefits we feel it is too big a market, with too many great people, to close the door.
Finding the right tenant
A strong referencing process and a good viewing process will help you to get the best applicant and remember that should an applicant struggle with affordability, do not hesitate to ask for a guarantor.
As a rule of thumb, we have a rent to income target of 35% but should affordability ratio be higher than this please remember that you can ask for a guarantor and if you are happy with the guarantor please remember to include them within the lease signing. The guarantor clause can be found in the Private Residential Tenancy agreement at clause 38.
Should a tenant in receipt of housing benefits not suit you, please do not fall into the discriminatory terms within some adverts of ‘No DSS’. Instead, please focus on what you are wanting like ‘Property suitable for Professional Couple’ or ‘Property would suit mature student’.
As a bonus, we have seen many properties getting more than the ‘market rent’ due to the houing benefit rate available for the area. We would encourage you to check what rent is available to you on the following link https://www.gov.scot/publications/local-housing-allowance-rates-2020-2021/
For further reading please review our posts on ‘How to screen an applicant’ and ‘Property Viewing Interview’
Should you have any questions, please call on 01315107590 or visit our website https://winwinpropertymanagement.co.uk
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