An interesting article in the January / February issue of Residential Property Investor looks at Fast Trak, a new company tackling the problems of too many social housing tenants, not enough social housing to put them in, and not enough private landlords willing to take a chance on them.
There are a myriad reasons why private landlords will not take social tenants. For example:
- Local housing allowance is paid direct to tenants, resulting in many tenants not passing the money on and building up serious rent arrears
- 95% of Local Authorities wanting to get people housed do not provide references
- It is not possible to know how much LHA tenants will receive (or indeed whether they will get any benefit at all) until after they have signed up
- Most councils take weeks to process applications, eight weeks being the norm (meaning that the tenant will be two months in arrears before any money comes in)
- Rent is then paid in arrears rather than (as is normal in the private sector) in advance, and then (to make matters worse) is paid every four weeks rather than every month
If the government had sat down and tried to set up an system which was going to put private landlords off taking social tenants, they could not have done much better!
Also , many landlords and agents believe that anyone on benefit is likely to be a poor tenant, although this is actually most unfair – many (perhaps the majority) of social tenants are responsible people looking for a long term tenancy in a property they are willing to look after well.
Fast Trak director Damon Thomas, was undeterred by all these problems. In his view the twin facts of empty private sector houses in need of tenants, and social tenants in need of housing, was a problem in search of a solution. He would be the one to provide that solution.
The solution he has come up with is as follows:
- Fast Trak will be a comprehensive assessment of a tenant. A poor credit history can be discounted if there are genuine reasons for it, for example if the tenant has fallen on hard times, he may be accepted. However ‘won’t pay’ tenants applications are taken no further.
- If the tenant is found to be acceptable, then Fast Trak will do the sums, calculating the likely LHA and assessing the tenants ability to pay any rent top up.
- The scheme then offers comprehensive insurance to landlords, guaranteeing them against non payment of rent, including delays in the calculation of benefit. Also if Fast Trak has miscalculated the LHA the insurance will make up the difference. The insurance will also cover any damage done by the tenant.
- The only payment necessary is a single up front application fee of £450, which in many cases will be paid by the Local Authority.
- Once the tenant has been accepted, he will be referred to one of the network of letting agents which will find the tenant the property.
The scheme is in its early days, but it appears to be supported by some 16 Local Authorities and has a network of 100 agents, hopefully soon to be more.
The Fast Trak solution sounds like an excellent one, and if it works and is accepted by local authorities and agents, could do really well. I wish it all the best
For more information see the website www.fasttrak.co.uk or telephone 03332 403332.
Have you had any experience of this scheme? If you are a landlord, would you be willing to take on a social tenant, if the Fast Trak insurance was provided? Do you think a scheme like this could help solve Local Authorities problems in finding housing for their social tenants? Please leave a comment.
Having tried to contact FastTrak social housing it would seem they are unavailable and are obviously offering a lot more than they can deliver…It would seem if you are in receipt of DSS you are almost prohibited from social mobility that you are trapped in your current circumstances.
I am disabled but have a good credit rating in my own right and can provide a guarantor if necessary but I am getting nowhere.
Hi Madasa, thank you for your comment. I am sorry you are having problems. What is other people’s experience with this company?
I’ve read other comments that you cant get through to FastTrack, I agree it too me foreva but when I got through I did an application within a day, and not long til i moved in,so its worth keep ringing because they will help you if they can. good luck.
Thanks Martirossi, glad you were sucessful in finding a place, thats great.
This is quite a popular page on the blog and your feedback will be helpful for readers.
I got throught to them, it took a while. However, they couldn’t help me at the time, because, I have just seperated from my husband, and we are buying this house. I wish to move, but am still on the mortgage. Even though I had spoken to several agents, explaining the situation, not on eof them told me (or were aware) that as I was still named on the mortgage I could not apply fro Housing Benefit, even though I am now on JSA. It was Fasttrak that told me this. My husband wants to keep the house on, so we are now writing to the lenders to have my name and any claim removed. Fingers Crossed.
I am very disappoointed with Fasttrak, I contacted them in May 2010 of this year and upto until now nothing has happened. I paid up £99 as administration fee and to be honest I wish I had not. The area where I live, you cannot find a flat with exact the same rent as one gets from benefits that means one has top up the difference, when I contacted them regarding this, I was told that if I wanted a flat that the rent is about £50 more than my housing benefit, I would have to pay upfront the difference for the year, the things is if I can afford to pay up that kind of money then obviously I would not need them. The reason I want to move out from my flat is because the flat does not have central heating but have portable electric heaters which are so expensive to run. Last month, one of the representatives called me to go and view a flat which has electric heating which is what I am trying to run away from. I have emailed them asking them what next and they have basically told me that most of the flats nowadays are electric central heating which is not true. I want to ask my £99 back because I cannot see them helping me at all.
Dear Rosa,
I am sorry to learn you are dissapointed with the service and I am happy to discuss your particular case directly if you would like to make contact, but would confirm that FastTrak offers all customers with a promise to refund your application deposit of £99 on request if we are not successful in finding you a property within 90 days.
Housing benefit rates are set by local authorities, not by FastTrak, and we can only work within these rates and an individuals personal affordability. We try and discourage tenants renting above their means, hence we will not approve tenancies at a rate higher than the level a client has been assessed for. If a tenant wishes to rent above that rate, then it is only permissable with an upfront payment, but I would stress that we neither recommend a client does this nor support the principle of clients doing this.
If anyone has any further queries about this service, perhaps they could contact Fast Trak direct, as I am now going to close comments here. No more comments will be published.