Landlord Support Team and Evict-Alert service

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The context

The 2017 Homelessness Reduction Act (HRA) placed new duties on English local authorities to prevent homelessness for all groups of people - not only households deemed to be in a priority need. The Act also extended the definition of ‘threatened with homelessness’ to households likely to become homeless within 56, rather than 28, days, encouraging earlier prevention work.

Since 2010, the leading cause of statutory homelessness in England has been loss of a PRS tenancy. Some Councils with high presentations from that sector reviewed their PRS prevention offer. Despite a longer prevention ‘window’ in law, Leeds City Council found 56 days before tenancy end was often still too late to prevent homelessness, so designed a landlord-facing service to prompt earlier contact.

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The intervention

Leeds City Council launched its pilot Landlord Support Team in 2019, aiming to change the culture of ‘inevitable eviction’ which affected most cases of PRS tenancy loss once a notice was served. The Council spoke to landlords they worked with through their PRS access scheme. Landlords said they valued a single point of contact in the Council if problems arose in a tenancy. It transpired that breakdown of landlord-tenant communication often, indeed usually, lay behind service of a notice. But by the time the case arrived at the Council, relationships were very often beyond repair.

The Landlord Support Team contains two landlord support officers and two housing advisers. Their remit is to encourage earlier contact from landlords who are having tenancy problems which may lead to them issuing a notice in time. This part of the service is called ‘Evict Alert’, though the team can provide advice and support at any point in a tenancy, not only where there’s a homelessness risk. Landlords housing homeless households through the PRS access scheme can also use the service.

The team is able to link tenants up with other Council services which enhance tenancy sustainment, including housing support, financial and welfare advice. Landlords have responded well, especially appreciating the Council’s welfare expertise and networks, as this is not something which tends to be offered by mainstream letting agencies. Landlords have also found the Council can sometimes ‘get through’ to a tenant when they’ve exhausted their own abilities in this regard.

The team also provides advice, signposting and service linkage for Housing Associations and supported accommodation projects intending to serve notice, enabling earlier intervention and/or planned moves, rather than crisis presentations. The Council has generally found that learning from reducing evictions from social housing can be applied to the PRS as well.

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The outcome

The Landlord Support Team estimates that they have been able to prevent homelessness in approximately 80% of cases referred by private landlords to Evict-Alert. Where it’s not possible to prevent homelessness, at the very least the Council has prior knowledge of the household, their situation and needs, meaning homelessness applications can be handled in a more planned manner.

Word of mouth has been a powerful tool in promoting the service, improving trust and confidence in the Council among private landlords. This has had the knock-on impact of generating approximately ten additional PRS tenancies per month for homeless households through the Council’s PRS access service, as landlords know that they will be supported.

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Key insights

• creating and/or enhancing a prevention service aimed at private landlords can also benefit tenants
• a bespoke support service aids prevention, and also brings homes to the PRS access service
• it is possible to stem the tide of PRS evictions into homelessness

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Find out more…

Gemma London, Housing Options Manager, Leeds City Council
gemma.london@leeds.gov.uk