This allegation has grown to catch the attention of the Government in recent weeks. The Minister for Housing and Homelessness, Heather Wheeler, will be working with tenant groups, buy-to-let mortgage lenders, Shelter (housing charity), insurers and other industry stakeholders “to tackle the practice of ‘No DSS’ to underline the need for immediate change”. Justin Tomlinson, Minister for Family Support, Housing and Child Maintenance, believes that the reluctance of some private landlords to let to prospective tenants in receipt of Housing Benefit/Universal Credit could be indirect discrimination under the 2010 Equality Act.

But many landlordss mortgage lenders and/or insurers apply restrictions not allowing to rent their properties to tenants in receipt of benefits, therefore making the decision for them and so not always the landlord making such decisions. £0ARLA Propertymark is continuing to campaign for the Government to address what it describes as the “systemic failures” of the implementation of Universal Credit, not least the delays in landlords receiving rents. £0

In recent weeks, many mortgage lenders have began to change their policies to lift such restrictions and the property portal websites such as Zoopla are also now not allowing the wording of No Benefits or No DSS or similar to appear in an agents advert on their website. £0

We await to see how this develops….

Please do not hesitate to contact us meanwhile should you wish to discuss.

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