Housing Associations in North Shropshire District

Registered Social Landlords

A Housing Association, otherwise known as Registered Social Landlord (RSL), is a non-profit making organisation providing homes for people in housing need.

There are a number of Housing Associations working in North Shropshire and these are as follows:

- Anchor Retirement Housing

- Accord Housing Association

- Beth Johnson Housing Association

- Bromford Housing Group

- Equity Housing Group

- Meres and Mosses Housing Association

- Raglan Housing Association

- Stonham Housing Association

- Shropshire Rural Housing Association

- Trident Housing Association

They mainly offer homes for rent, but they also provide properties to buy on a shared ownership basis (this is where you part buy and part rent).  They also offer supported housing for the elderly and disabled, clients with special needs, young single homeless and clients fleeing domestic violence.

The RSLs have many homes in the District with a wide variety of types and sizes of properties owned by them including houses with gardens, flats, bungalows and garages.  The properties are mainly located in and around the four market towns of Market Drayton, Whitchurch, Ellesmere and Wem.

About Registerd Social Landlords

Unpaid management committees, made up of people committed to tackling housing issues run RSLs.  Full time paid staff carry out the policies of each of the RSLs.

The Cost of providing new homes comes mainly from two sources:

• Money from the Government that is given to RSLs by the Housing Corporation.
• RSLs borrowing from financial institutions such as banks.

Rents paid by RSL tenants have to cover these borrowing costs as well as those associated with the management and maintenance of the properties.

The Housing Corporation (a Government agency) not only funds RSLs but also monitors and regulates their activities.  There is a Regional Office for the Housing Corporation in Wolverhampton in the West Midlands.  The address is 31 Waterloo Road, Wolverhampton, WV1 4DJ.

Tel: 01902 795000 Fax: 01902 795001,

Website: www.housingcorp.gov.uk,

email: westmidlands.info@housingcorp.gsx.gov.uk

Registerd Social Landlord's and North Shropshire District Council

The RSLs in North Shropshire work with the District Council to develop new homes in the District.

Tenancies:  North Shropshire District Council has transferred its housing stock to the newly formed Meres and Mosses Housing Association.  The majority of its tenants have a secure tenancy but new tenants who join after the transfer with have an assured tenancy.  RSLs normally offer assured tenancies and broadly these tenancies have the same rights as those with secure tenancies.  Whilst the names are different and the detailed conditions can vary, both types of tenancy only come to an end if the tenant gives notice or if the RSL take action because the tenant has broken the tenancy conditions ie, neighbour nuisance, not paid the rent etc.

 

Rents: RSLs aim to provide affordable housing and each organisation sets it own rents.  Because RSLs tend to have fewer properties, rents tend to be higher than those of the ex Council properties but they will normally be within housing benefit levels and the running costs are often less because they are newer properties that have been built to higher energy efficiency standards.

 

Right to Buy:  Tenants transferring to Meres and Mosses Housing Association have preserved Right to Buy which means that they can buy their property at some stage, but this is not normally the case for other housing association tenants.  There are a number of ownership schemes available to housing association tenants.  Individual landlords would be able to give further advice.