Affordable rent, worst predictions come true

Following a Freedom of Information request, in October last year Red Brick revealed that 82,000 social rented homes were likely to be ‘converted’ to the much more expensive ‘affordable rent’ regime in a desperate attempt to fund the Government’s flagship programme. A new independent report on the affordable rent programme by Future of London shows that, at December 2012, there were 543 lettings of new build affordable rent homes in the Capital but 2,571 conversions from traditional social rent – nearly 5 conversions for every single new build home so far. It effectively means that these homes have had an imposed rent increase of 40-50%. Because the Government stipulated that ‘affordable rent’ homes should be let on the same basis as ‘social rent’, the inevitable has happened: new tenants are even more reliant on housing benefit. Not only have social rented homes been hijacked but also the pain will be felt through increased housing benefit payments for many years to come.