Benefit Regulation Changes January 2012

Single and under 35?

The Government is planning to extend the age group for single young people who can only claim a shared accommodation rate to help with their rent (rather than being able to claim for self-contained one-bedroom accommodation).

This means you may only be entitled to the lower rate of Housing Benefit for a room in shared accommodation if all of the following apply:

• you are a single person
• you are occupying one-bedroom self-contained accommodation in the private rented sector
• your Housing Benefit is due to be reviewed from January 2012 onwards
• at the date of the review you will be aged 25 or over but under 35 years, and
• you are not covered by any of the exemptions on sharing accommodation.

The change means that from January 2012 onwards, instead of the one-bedroom self-contained rate as has been notified to you, you would move onto the shared accommodation rate applying at that date, which may be much lower. The details of the change will not be known until they are agreed in Parliament later this year. Even when this happens, we will not be able to tell you the exact Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rate for shared accommodation as these change from month to month. However the current shared accommodation rate for property in your area is shown on the |Broad Market Rent Area page which will give you an indication of the likely rate next year. If you are not assessed under LHA rules we cannot provide you with an estimate at present, although the rate you get is likely to be much lower than the rate you currently get.

Further information about these changes and the current shared accommodation rates in different parts of the country is available at the Direct Gov website ­- |DirectGov (under local housing allowance) these rates are shown as the '1 Bedroom with shared facilities' rates, but are only relevant to those who are assessed under the Local Housing Allowance rules.