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1444 on housing waiting list in York

There are currently 1444 people registered on the housing waiting list in York.

3 of these have been given an emergency classification with a further 204 in the top urgency category (Gold).

The York Council is leaving the North Yorkshire pooled “home choice” system next November (2020). It will then implement its own housing allocations policies.

There are currently 7512 Council homes in York. Around 600 a year of these become available for reletting. Since 2014, 522 additional homes have been added to the pool although this has been offset by 324 “right to buy” sales.

The Council hopes to build an additional 600 new homes across York over the next few years.

One major issue facing York is the demand for elderly persons accommodation. York has an estimated shortage of independent living and extra care properties which is forecast to be over 1100 independent living properties and almost 500 extra care properties by 2039.

68% of York’s’ housing is owner occupied. Average house prices have risen by 25% over the last 4 years to £235,000. That is nearly 9 times the average wage.  In the same period rents on private 2 bed properties have risen by 11.5% to £725 a month.

For those living on benefits, there is a major gulf between income and monthly private sector rents.

Housing affordability in York

Unfortunately, the Council has no influence on the terms of “Right to Buy” sales, so must try to bridge the gap with new build.

Some better news for those on the housing waiting list in York

Mean waiting times on the waiting list for those seeking to rent one and two bedroomed properties reduced last year.

In 2015/2016 the median waiting time for a property from the housing waiting list was 259 days

Last year (2016/2017) this had fallen to 222 days

Waiting times for 3 bedroomed properties increased.

Listed below by year are the median waiting times for a property by assessed bed need

 2015/16 2016/17

· 1-bed home

 277 162

· 2-bed home

 255

237

· 3-bed home

 226

371
· 4-bed home 321

326

By the end of April 2017 the numbers on the waiting list in York for different sizes of property were

  • 1038 applications for a 1 bedroom
  • 642 applications with a 2 bed need
  • 200 applications with a 3 bed need
  • 45 applications with a 4 bed need
  • 5 applications with a 5 bed need

Applicants seeking to rent properties from social landlords in the City should visit the following web site. https://www.northyorkshirehomechoice.org.uk/

Tories plan to scrap current housing waiting list allocation system

No choice to be offered to those in housing need

Choice based lettingsOn 17 October the York Council is likely to authorise changes to the current housing registrations service.

City of York Council operates a choice based lettings (CBL) system for applicants to bid for affordable rented homes across North Yorkshire and York. The system was introduced by the LibDem administration in 2011.

The Council says that “a recent review of it has identified changes that would streamline processes for applicants and officers. The detailed consultation and review included involving staff from multiple council services as well as visits to other local authorities that use other application or bidding systems. The council also conducted two consultations with customers on the current system.

A number of changes have already taken place including streamlining administration, interviewing new applicants and updating housing advice.

The Executive Member will be asked to give officers authority to work with the North Yorkshire Home Choice partnership to discuss changing from a choice based lettings (advertising and bidding) system to an officer allocation system based on customer preference, and also to start discussions about future changes to the allocations and letting policy.

York housing waiting list falls to 1546

The number of residents on the social housing waiting list in York fell from 2311 in 2014 to 1546 in March 2015.

During last year 241 people were rehoused by Housing Associations in the City.

That figure compared to 209 in the previous year.

454 people from the housing waiting list were offered accommodation in Council houses.

That is down from a high of 551 which was seen in 2012.

York social housing waiting list details

The York Council has released details of the make up of the social housing waiting list.

The list consists of mainly younger people.

2333 applicants  

Ages:

16-17

5

18-24

383

25-31

468

32-38

388

39-45

299

46-52

255

53-59

214

60-64

87

65-69

97

70-74

58

75-79

35

80+

44

Not surprisingly the vast majority describe themselves as “white British”. No doubt UKIP will be disappointed to find that only one Rumanian national has registered on the list!

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Labour’s housing waiting list scam – Freedom of Information request submitted

click to access

click to access

A Freedom of Information request has been submitted aimed at getting to the bottom of the recent drop in the number of people on the social housing waiting list in York.

The number on the  list fell from over 4600 families at the beginning of September, to only 2200 in October. No new social housing developments were completed for occupation during that period.

It turned out that a behind closed doors decision had been taken to kick more than half of the applicants off the list.

We now understand that most of these were deemed to be people who did not have a real housing need and who had not applied for any of the homes advertised during the previous 12 months.

Of the others, 140 were already homeowners and 187 had no local connection while 13 had no local connection and were also homeowners

57 applicants had their application banding changed from Gold to Silver.
The Council has to respond within 28 days to the FOI request.
The request seeks details of how the decision was taken, when and by whom.

It asks the Council what consultation was undertaken.

It seeks more information about the categories of people who have been thrown off the register.

Labour fiddle York housing waiting list figures

Cabinet member orders that 2400 residents be taken off list

Earlier in the week a report, which is being presented to the York Council “Cabinet”, claimed that the numbers on the Housing waiting list had more than halved in 6 months.

click for source document

click for source document

The report showed that only 2420 are now registered on the list – down from 4692 at the end of March.

4692 was the figure quoted by Labour to justify their plans to build 22,000 additional homes over the next 15 years, mainly on green belt land next to the City.

No explanation was given for this phenomenal reduction which was simply labelled as a “decrease”.

It was all the more surprising as, since Labour took control of the Council the supply of new “affordable” homes, has tailed off.

It now turns out that the change has been achieved simply by taking people off the list who Labour Councillors feel are not in housing need.

These include all those in the so called “bronze” category.

This is another decision that has been taken without any consultation and behind closed doors. It has not been widely publicised since it was introduced about 4 weeks ago..

No doubt Labour hoped, nearer the next Council elections, to announce that they had “solved” York’s housing problems.

Electors are not so easily fooled.

Behind closed doors logoIt is time that the Council ordered a public scrutiny review of the way in which the North Yorkshire housing waiting list has been massaged.

Some of the revised criteria that are now being applied will win general support (listed below).

Many however will find this new example of secrecy a sinister development.

The key changes are listed below.

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“Get York Building” – Labour lethargy sees housing waiting list grow to 4674

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click to enlarge

The number of “affordable” homes built in York during the current financial year is expected to be around 102. It has fallen from a figure of 282 which were completed in 2010/11, the final year of Liberal Democrat Council control.

Now the Council seem to have realised that they bear a large measure of responsibility for the increase in the numbers on the waiting list for homes.

That list now has 4674 names on it!

In a pretentiously entitled report “Get York Building” the Labour Council blames everyone and everything for their failures.

Although making a claim that many developments are “underway”, the report fails to tabulate the position on the individual sites. In reality over 1600 potential homes are on sites with a current planning permission but are currently “stalled” . (Larger strategic developments that are ‘stalled’ – e.g. Nestle, Terry’s, Germany Beck, York Central & British Sugar are not included in this total.)

Contributory factors to the impasse include a continuing difficulty in getting mortgages while developers also have reported problems getting capital for small speculative house building projects.

The Council are proposing to ease the proportion of “affordable” homes required to 20% on planning permissions issued on brownfield sites. It remains to be seen whether this has any practical effect.

Labour are also reversing their objection to “off site” financial contributions in lieu of affordable homes being built on the development site itself. These will still be a hefty £23,133 per unit (a figure that is passed on to new home buyers of course).

The Council has now said that it will provide 1000 new homes each year on average over the next 5 years. That is a ludicrously improbable figure given past performance.

With a 20% affordable element, that would mean that only 200 affordable homes would be provided each year compared to Labours election promise of 790.

York housing waiting list continues to grow as new homes fail to materialise

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click to enlarge

The numbers, wanting to rent homes from the Council or Housing Associations in York, has risen by over 2000 applicants (78%) since Labour took control of the York Council.

In addition over 17,000 are registered for homes with partner Councils in the Yorkshire area.

Despite this demand, the Council has seen a significant drop in the number of new homes completed.

Discounting specialist student accommodation, only 151 new homes have been completed in York so far during this financial year.

Only 29 of these are classed as “affordable”.

2012/13 could prove to be the worst year, for new family home building, in the City’s modern history.

The Council has rejected the idea of approving more homes to be let at “intermediate” rents (80% of full market rents) but has failed to identify a way of constructing any additional council houses.

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click to enlarge

Housing waiting list changing

All current City of York Housing Register Applicants (both waiting and transfer list) over the next 3 weeks will be contacted by letter inviting them to re register for the new North Yorkshire Home Choice register.
Current applicants who are invited to re register can do this either on line or by filling in a paper form. The Council will actively be encouraging applicants where appropriate and where they can to apply on line. They will be able to go into the offices both in the City and Acomb for assistance to complete either on line or paper forms, there will be staff available at all times at both offices to assist them.
Customers will have until the 31st March 2011 to re register. If they apply after this date their application start date will be taken from the date of their new application and they will loose out on valuable time on the list. It is imperative that customers re register prior to the 31st March to ensure they keep their original registration date as this will affect their position when we go live with choice based lettings as time on list/in band is one of the deciding factors on which bid is top of the list and gets the offer of a property.
The Council will be sending out reminder letters in mid March to all those applicants who have failed to re register, to remind them of the importance of registering prior to the 31st March and again how and where they can re register and what help and support is available to them.
The new policy and system will go live in mid June.