Homelessness
If you are homeless or at risk of being homeless, the Council can provide assistance to prevent or relieve your situation.
People at risk of homelessness, or homeless can include the following;
- Getting behind with rent
- Living in unsecure circumstances
- Property not suitable for needs
- Sofa surfing, including with family
- Leaving secure estate or other institution or placement
- Losing a job-related tenancy
- Having been served with an eviction notice whether at fault or not
- Rough sleeping
These are just some examples. If you are unsure or think you need help, contact us.
What we can do
Our first priority will be to help prevent your potential homelessness from becoming a reality. We will need to investigate your circumstances thoroughly including speaking to others about your situation such as your family, landlord or other professional you might be engaged with. We need to do this because we need to verify your circumstances and explore ways to prevent homelessness. If there are any sensitive issues such as abuse, we will take this into consideration and work around it.
We might ask others to help assist you, such as our housing standards team, if there is disrepair at the property or harassment, or a housing support worker who can help apply for benefits and look for accommodation.
If we are unsuccessful in preventing the homelessness, we will help you to find somewhere else to live. You’ll need to help as well by following up on any leads, helping us explore your finances and working with support agencies to better your situation. We’ll work together to create a Personal Housing Plan to help guide you with the steps you can take.
Local Connection
Through our investigation we will also check whether you have a local connection with the area. If you haven’t lived here long, or are only here temporarily, we may look to reconnect you back to your home Local Authority. You can still receive advice and guidance without a local connection, but we may not offer full services.
Temporary Accommodation
If necessary we will offer you temporary accommodation. Unfortunately this isn’t always in an area you’d chose as we have a fixed supply. We try to keep you in temporary accommodation for as short as possible.
Temporary accommodation isn’t free, and you’ll have to pay a rent any bills at the property.
Intentionality
Although we will provide a period of help and assistance for everyone who is determined to be homeless, (according to our assessment undertaken under Housing (Wales) Act 2014) after 8 weeks we will do a further assessment for intentionality.
We will be looking at whether you did or didn’t take any actions which led to you becoming homeless that could have been avoided if you had acted differently. The sort of things that can lead to us deciding you are intentionally homeless include things like whether you had rent arrears that could have been avoided, acted with anti-social behaviour or voluntarily gave up your accommodation.
If we find you to be intentionally homeless, our duty to help you can be ended, along with any accommodation we might have provided. If you are not intentionally homeless we will continue to help you.
The test of intentionality and to whom it is applied can be found below.
This Notice is to advise you that with effect from Friday 26th May 2023, Ceredigion County Council will be applying the "Test of Intentionality" to the following categories of people in priority need.
Ceredigion County Council currently assess intentionality and will continue to do so for all client groups identified below.
- A pregnant woman or a person with whom she resides or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person with whom a dependent child resides or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person who is vulnerable as a result of some special reason (for example: old age, physical or mental illness or physical or mental disability), or with whom they reside or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person who is homeless or threatened with homelessness as a result of an emergency such as flood, fire or other disaster, or with whom they reside or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person who is aged 16 or 17 yrs
- A person who is homeless as a result of being subject to domestic abuse or with whom they reside (other than the abuser) or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person who has attained the age of 18, when the person applies to a local housing authority for accommodation or help in obtaining or retaining accommodation but not the age of 21, who is at particular risk of sexual or financial exploitation, or with whom they reside (other than an exploiter or potential exploiter) or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person who has attained the age of 18, when the person applies to a local housing authority for accommodation or help in obtaining or retaining accommodation, but not the age of 21, who was looked after, accommodated or fostered at any time while under the age of 18
- A person who has served in the regular armed forces of the Crown who has been homeless since leaving, or with whom they reside or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person who has a local connection with the area of the local authority and who is vulnerable as a result of one of the following reasons -
- Having served a custodial sentence within the meaning of Section 76 of the Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000
- Having been remanded in or committed to custody by an order of a court
- Having been remanded to youth detention accommodation under Section 91(4) of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012,or a person with whom such a person resides or might reasonably be expected to reside
- A person who is street homeless (within the meaning of section 71(2)), or with whom they might reasonably be expected to reside
Contact Us
You can contact the housing service by calling the contact centre on 01545 570881 or by emailing housingoptions@ceredigion.gov.uk.