We are increasing rents to ensure we can continue providing the essential services you rely on, including maintaining and repairing homes. Like many organisations, the costs of delivering these services have risen significantly in recent years.

The rent increase takes effect from April – the exact dates and instructions for paying that apply to you can be found in the letter you will have received from us in February. Customers who pay their rent weekly on a Monday will make their first payment of the new amount on 7 April 2025.

The government sets the maximum we can increase our rent by. This is linked to inflation. We have used the government guidance when calculating your new rent charge. On average our rents remain well below that of similar privately rented homes. For shared ownership customers, rents are set in accordance with the terms of your lease agreement.

If you’re finding it hard to afford your rent, please contact us straight away. The sooner you let us know about any financial difficulties, the easier it will be for us to help. Our team of qualified money advice experts are here and ready to help you whatever your situation. Call the team on 0300 555 6666 or visit our money and bills advice page.

Some customers pay a charge for additional services they receive from us. If this applies to you, these amounts are included in your total weekly charge. Service charges reflect the actual cost of providing those services to you and may include the costs for things like energy and maintenance contracts. Any increases to your service charge will be explained in your annual rent charge review letter.

You will have received an annual rent charge review letter from us. If your housing costs are paid for by Universal Credit:

• keep this letter somewhere safe – you will need it in April
• wait until you are sent a ‘to-do’ in April called ‘Confirm your housing costs’
• use the information in this letter to complete the ‘to-do’ before the due date to avoid problems with your payments.

 

It’s a good idea to set a reminder or make a note to do this. If you don’t you could miss out on money you are entitled to.

If part or all of your rent is paid for by Housing Benefit, you do not need to do anything as we have contacted your local authority on your behalf.

We will automatically adjust your Direct Debit, so you don’t need to do anything. We will send a separate letter to your rent review letter confirming what your new Direct Debit will be.

If you pay your rent by standing order you need to contact your bank to change your payment to the new amount given in your annual letter.

Did you know? You can set up a Direct Debit for rent payments online and future payments will be automatically adjusted, meaning you do not have to do anything if your rent amount changes. Alternatively you can give us a call on 0300 555 6666.

As a not-for-profit organisation, all rent we receive is used to provide our services and repair and improve homes.

We are a not-for-profit registered charity, which means every penny of your rent is reinvested into running our services and maintaining and improving homes. We spent £65.1m on improving homes last year.

Your rent payment is due in advance. It is important that you keep up to date with your rent, as it is part of your tenancy agreement. But if you are unable to keep up with your payments, please get in touch with us straight away so we can discuss how we may be able to support you. Our priority is keeping you in your home, so we will do our best to work with you to resolve the situation.

If things haven’t gone as you expected or you’re unhappy with something we did, please let us know. We’ll work with you to understand what happened and do our best to put it right. You can do this by filling in our feedback form.

You can find out the balance of your rent account and see recent transactions quickly and easily through our online service.

Sign up or sign in manage your home online.

It’s really important that you let us know if you are struggling to pay your shared ownership rent as we can’t help you if we are not aware of your situation. You can also seek advice from Citizens Advice or Money Helper or gain practical help from Turn2us.