Accommodation Concern

Accommodation Concern prevents and alleviates poverty, need, hardship and distress, by delivering advice, support and preventative services designed to end homelessness, build independence and resilience and improve well-being and life chances. All services are free, at the point of delivery, and open to anyone from 16 years of age.

Accommodation Concern is an independent, dedicated anti-poverty and homelessness prevention charity, based in Kettering. Our advice is free and impartial.

Our advice services hold the Advice Quality Standard in Housing, Debt and Welfare Benefits.

Housing Advice
This is a free independent service that deals with a wide range of housing issues, such as homelessness, young person’s housing rights, repairs, illegal evictions and much more.

The Housing Advice Service also offers welfare benefit advice and debt advice.

Our 30 years’ of experience tells us that prompt and accurate advice helps people to make informed choices and can often prevent the trauma, emotional, physical and financial cost of homelessness.

At Accommodation Concern our core objective is to deliver good quality, accurate and accessible housing advice and support aimed at preventing homelessness and alleviating hardship, need and distress.

We will provide free and impartial Housing advice including:

• Eviction paperwork
• Rights and responsibilities of tenants & landlords
• Liaise with council/housing associations
• Court representation
• Homelessness
• Access to social or private housing
• Repairs
• Legal obligations of tenants
• Welfare Benefit Advice Service
• We can offer Welfare Benefits advice including:
• Maximising income/Benefit checks – are you claiming everything you are entitled to?
• PIP claims/Appeals
• Employment Support Allowance claims/appeals

Supported Accommodation
Accommodation Concern has a supported housing provision for single homeless people, building life skills, preparing for independent living, increasing confidence through a planned programme of re-settlement. This is self-funded and supported by donations from the public.

Single homeless people with low/medium needs.

We have 3 & 4 Bed properties in Kettering, and the surrounding areas - residents have their own rooms and share communal spaces with access to regular weekly support where they work with us to build their confidence and support with their identified needs.

Six to 12 months is the average staying time. Each person will, together with their support worker identify the areas they wish to develop which may vary from cooking, basic skills to relationship breakdowns that have led them to become homeless.

Without us these people would be homeless or sofa surfing. They would really struggle to access social housing and would likely not be considered to be a priority. We also provide bed packs: pillows, duvet, protectors, towel, mattress protector, sheet. These packs become our clients to they can take them with them when they leave us as a start for their new property.

Eligibility

All schemes are for single adults who would benefit from a period in supported housing to build the skills necessary to successfully maintain an independent tenancy.
A preference will be given to applicants who have a local connection to North Northants and a level of housing need.
Applicants, where possible, should be deemed “unable to work currently” by the DWP
No pets are allowed at any of our schemes.
All our schemes are provided with ‘move on’ in mind so applicants need to have capacity to maintain their own tenancy after the intensive support finishes.
We anticipate applicants will be with us for a period of between 6 and 12 months.
All applicants must engage with the support/training element of the scheme.
Applicants with outstanding housing related debt will be supported to establish and maintain a repayment plan to ensure they are able to ‘move on’. If this is not adhered to the licence will be revoked.
Note that the following applicants will not be considered for an allocation under this Policy:

Applicants with a history of Arson
Applications with a history of sexual offences
Applicants currently requiring an ongoing high level of mental health interventions and support
The following applicants may be considered for an allocation under this Policy, but will need to disclose all relevant details: Any history that is withheld may cause any offer to be withdrawn immediately.

Applicants who have unspent convictions relating to crimes against persons or property, or a history of serious anti-social behaviour
Applicants with substance or alcohol addictions/misuse or who have a recent history of such addiction/misuse
Applicants with a history of mental health interventions and support