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What should I do if I am homeless?
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Housing options for lone parents factsheet
If you are homeless, or threatened with homelessness, you should go to your local authority's Homeless Person's Unit and ask to talk to someone about making a homeless application. If there is a possibility that you might be helped to stay in your current home, and this is what you want, you can ask the local authority to provide you with practical and legal advice to do this.
In an emergency situation, if you need to contact the Homeless Person's Unit during the evening or at weekends, ring your local authority's main switchboard and you should be provided with a number for emergencies. If you have nowhere to stay, then emergency accommodation should be offered to you. This is likely to be a hostel, or a bed and breakfast hotel or other emergency accommodation owned by the local authority or a housing association. Wherever possible, it is better for you to approach the local authority before an emergency happens.
For non-emergencies, call Shelterline (see Further help and information) or, if possible, contact your local housing aid centre, Citizens Advice Bureau or Law Centre for support and advice. See Further help and information for details of how to contact these organisations.
How does the local authority decide what help I'm entitled to?
The local authority will carry out five tests to decide what help you are entitled to. These are to see whether you:
1. are eligible for assistance. If you have been informed that you do not qualify for any help, for example, because you are subject to immigration control, seek specialist advice immediately. You must be given grounds for the decision in writing and you have the right to ask for a review of this decision.
2. are homeless, or threatened with homelessness within 28 days. You should be classed as homeless if you have nowhere else to stay (in the UK or elsewhere), cannot afford to stay in your current accommodation or if you are staying with friends or relatives and have been asked to leave. You will be considered threatened with homelessness if you will become homeless within 28 days. If you have been subjected to, or are at risk from, violence or would be if you returned home, you should be considered to be homeless.
3. have a priority need. As a pregnant woman or a lone parent responsible for dependent children, you will be classed as in priority need.
4. are not intentionally homeless. You will need to show that you did not deliberately do something, or failed to do something, which caused you to lose your home, when it would have been reasonable for you to stay. The local authority should not make assumptions about why you have left or lost your home. You need to show that you lost your home due to circumstances beyond your control, for example because you had no legal right to stay there or because you had financial problems caused by the end of your relationship or a job loss. You should not be classed as intentionally homeless if you left home because you experienced or were threatened with violence. It can be complicated to show you did not make yourself intentionally homeless so get specialist independent advice. Contact the Lone Parent Helpline (see Further help and information) for information on how to find organisations that can help.
5. have a local connection to the area. The local authority may not accept responsibility to provide long-term accommodation for you if it decides that neither you nor the members of your household has a connection with the area. You will usually be considered to have a local connection if you have lived in the area for a total of 6 out of the last 12 months or 3 out of the last 5 years, or have employment or family links to the area. If you have no connection to the area where you originally applied, the local authority dealing with your application can refer you to another local authority where you do have a local connection. However, if there is a risk of violence, to either you or a member of your household, the local authority cannot refer you to that area and may either decide to house you themselves or refer you to an area that does not present a risk.See Shelter's website (see Further help and information) for a five-step online assessment, which can help you to work out what assistance you will be entitled to.
What will the local authority do if I am entitled to help?
As a lone parent with dependent children (or a pregnant woman), the local authority has a duty to provide you with temporary ('interim') accommodation if they believe that you may be homeless. This may be in a hostel or bed and breakfast accommodation (see below). The local authority will then make enquiries as to whether they have to provide you with long-term accommodation.
If, after making enquiries into your situation, it is decided that you qualify for help, the local authority must provide you
with somewhere to live where you will normally stay until settled accommodation has been arranged for you. Both temporary and settled accommodation could be in public or private housing.
Any settled accommodation that the local authority offers you must be suitable for your needs. You should consider any offers carefully (some local authorities may only make one offer) and seek advice about anything that you are unsure of, before you accept. Details of what counts as settled accommodation can be found on Shelter's website, or by contacting them (see Further help and information).
If the local authority has housed you in temporary accommodation but subsequently decides that you are not entitled to long-term accommodation (because, for example, you are intentionally homeless), you should be allowed to remain in the temporary accommodation for around 28 days while you find somewhere to live. If it is considered that you are not homeless, the local authority still has an obligation to provide you with advice on finding somewhere to live; this will include information about private sector housing.
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