Shelter report exposes housing situation in UK

In a previous blog post we highlighted a recent report studying the housing situation in St Andrews. We have now archived a new study commissioned by Shelter, and conducted by the University of St Andrews, which highlights the UK wide housing situation.

The report came out with 3 key findings:

1.  In the UK there is a high risk combination of low pay, high cost housing, and limited housing benefits.
2.  A drop in income is usually followed by a house move as there is little support offered by the housing safety net* to meet the cost of rent/mortgage payments while a new job is sought.
3.  More affordable housing is needed to reduce reliance on the housing safety net.

*The housing safety net is defined as the various housing benefits that are designed to alleviate the pressure of mortgage and rent payments.

Over 6 million households receive support from the housing safety net, of which 500,000 homes are in need of additional support. Added to this are the 100,000 homes that are in need of support but are not currently receiving any sort of help from the housing safety net. The report concludes that there are currently around 625,000 homes that are falling through the safety net and are desperately in need of additional support.

The full report can be viewed here.