Moving from family home - Rent Allowance

Bog Warrior

Hello all..

I hope some of you might be able help me with this..

I am a year out of work and live in the schticks. After becoming unemployed, I rented for a month or two then moved back to family home so as not to incur more burden on the state. i think this might have been a bad move.

There's no work around here so I am thinking of headin east to the city and looking for either a job or part time jobs hopefully enough to fill a working week.

I won't be able to afford rent initially (no savings) and will have to move before securing jobs (particularly part-time work). Is there any help available in my quest?

Will I be able to get rent allowance immediately or is there processing time?

Any help appreciated.

edellc

http://www.citizensinformation.ie/categories/social-welfare/social-welfare-payments/supplementary-welfare-schemes/rent_supplement

all you need to know is in the link above

Bog Warrior

Yes well thank you.

I had seen that page before but I can't find on it the answers I am looking for, so I was hoping there might be someone here who can speak from experience or knowledge.

snubbleste

Bog Warrior wrote: »

Yes well thank you.
I had seen that page before but I can't find on it the answers I am looking for, so I was hoping there might be someone here who can speak from experience or knowledge.

What don't you understand in the link provided?

Bog Warrior

There is nothing I don't understand.

I asked whether anybody here knew of any assistance or options available to a person in my situation.

I also asked whether there would be a processing time for rent allowance and if so what would it be. Would this processing time prohibit moving home when one has no savings to pay for rent in the mean time.

Please only reply if you can help with knowledge or experience. Thanks

Balagan

Bog Warrior wrote: »

Yes well thank you.

I had seen that page before but I can't find on it the answers I am looking for, so I was hoping there might be someone here who can speak from experience or knowledge.

To get rent allowance you would need to be already presently renting; to have done so for minimum of the past six months and to have experienced an unforseen change of circumstance that left you unable to pay the rent or, alternatively, to apply to the Local Authority and be assessed by it as eligible for and in need of housing.

Bog Warrior

Balagan wrote: »

to apply to the Local Authority and be assessed by it as eligible for and in need of housing.

Yes I read that.
Do you know whether this means that there would be a delay in processing such a claim prohibiting a move at all?

Do you know whether there is any other assistance available to someone forced to move for work who will have to pay rent?

snubbleste

Phone up the local authority housing dept. in the area you wish to move to and ask them how long it takes to be means-assessed for housing.

shoegirl

Bog Warrior wrote: »

Yes well thank you.

I had seen that page before but I can't find on it the answers I am looking for, so I was hoping there might be someone here who can speak from experience or knowledge.

To summarise it, they will allow you to claim rent allowance if you "habitually" rent - that means if you have evidence that you have paid rent to a private landlord for 6 months out of the previous 12.

You should show your last rent book to the CWO, if there are 6 months out of 12 they should accept your claim. That said, Dublin would be a tad expensive - RA at best will only get you a grubby bedsit. But it is a start and for some people the job situation would be hugely improved.

I did exactly the same as you except I was moving back to family home in Dublin rather than the other way round. To give you an idea of how much that improved my prospects, I had only managed to get 2 f2f interviews in Cork after nearly 4 months job search. At the end of barely 4 weeks in Dublin I had 8 interviews, 1 offer and 2 more invitations to f2f interviews. The job, by the way, pays nearly 40% more than my last one so I'm not losing out either.

Put it this way - it might not count for everybody, but I went from getting 1 interview every 8 weeks down south to 1 every 2.5 days in Dublin. If I had stayed put down south at that rate it would have taken about 1 year to get a job. Not surprisingly, this is bearing out with the colleagues who were laid off - just one out of nearly 30 so far has secured a local job - 2 more of us have got work in Dublin or UK. The rest are still on the dole.

You should not have to apply to the housing list if you've evidence of having rented 6/12 months previously. But putting name on list would help.
Waiting times would be dependent on workload of the office you apply to - these are local.
Another thing to consider is rent is paid in arrears. This means you would have to pay the deposit and first months rent yourself.

Bog Warrior

snubbleste wrote: »

Phone up the local authority housing dept. in the area you wish to move to and ask them how long it takes to be means-assessed for housing.

Thats a good idea.. I'll do that thanks

Bog Warrior

shoegirl wrote: »

Put it this way - it might not count for everybody, but I went from getting 1 interview every 8 weeks down south to 1 every 2.5 days in Dublin. If I had stayed put down south at that rate it would have taken about 1 year to get a job. Not surprisingly, this is bearing out with the colleagues who were laid off - just one out of nearly 30 so far has secured a local job - 2 more of us have got work in Dublin or UK. The rest are still on the dole.

You should not have to apply to the housing list if you've evidence of having rented 6/12 months previously. But putting name on list would help.
Waiting times would be dependent on workload of the office you apply to - these are local.
Another thing to consider is rent is paid in arrears. This means you would have to pay the deposit and first months rent yourself.

Thanks shoegirl. I think it will improve my prospects a lot too. I can afford a deposit and month's rent in advance, but after that I'm sunk unless the money starts coming in. I've been at home for a year so can only go the housing list route.

There used to be back to work assistance I have read, but there isn't much to help rent paying people forced to move for work, is there?

imlostatsea

Another thing you could do is peaster the hell out of the Cwo every week, find out where she is evey day and go til she give you help in some form or another and the same for the social, My experience wasn't great im in the same postiton as you at the moment and I'm finding it hard to move because Ive no money to get a deposit, but I do know you can get once and once only in your life a deposit for renting a house off the CWO which I'm currently pestering her for so i can move to Dublin and if She don't give it by november I'm off to england to join my sister cause if they dont want me workin here (and i have been offered jobs in dublin just dont have the money to move) ill work in London.
But Check out the INOU website and call them also cause they been more of a help then Citizen information and are more focused at the unemployed etc they can tell you what benefits etc you are entitled to more than Citizen info. hope Ive helped

Bog Warrior

Thanks imlostatsea,

that unemployed association website is very helpful indeed

billy the squid

snubbleste wrote: »

What don't you understand in the link provided?

I would strongly suggest you be lest confrontational in your posting in the future.