Introduction

From 7 April 2008 the Government has introduced a new scheme called Local Housing Allowance (LHA) for most private tenants (it will not affect housing association tenants).  The two changes are

• A new way of deciding the amount of rent that is used in the Housing Benefit assessment
• Usually, Housing Benefit payments will be sent to the customer and not the landlord

Once the amount of rent that will be used in the Housing Benefit assessment has been decided, other factors (such as the customer's income & capital, and other people living in the household) will still be taken into account when calculating Housing Benefit entitlement.  If you would like an estimate of the amount of Housing Benefit that you may be entitled to, you should follow these steps

1. Read the "Size Criteria" section below to work out how many bedrooms you are entitled to
2. Look at the table in the "Monthly LHA Rates" section below to see what the current LHA rate for this month is
3. Use the online Benefit Calculator to be given a trial calculation

If you don't have a bank account to pay Housing Benefit into, this will not usually be a reason for LHA payments to be sent to your landlord.  We have therefore produced a leaflet that can downloaded from the information leaflets page that provides details about some of the Basic Bank Accounts that are available.

The new LHA rules will be applied to

• New claims
• Existing claims following a change of address
• New claims immediately following the award of a four-week Extended Payment
• New claims following a break in benefit entitlement of at least one week

Existing continuous claims will not be subject to the new LHA rules.  This means that all current claims will continue to be paid under the existing rules until there is a break in entitlement of at least a week, or the customer moves address or is awarded a four-week Extended Payment.

LHA is based on a flat rate allowance determined by The Rent Service that reflects the size of the customer's household.  This amount is not directly related to the rent that is charged, so the Housing Benefit award may be higher (subject to a £15 per week cap) or lower than the amount of rent that the customer must pay their landlord.

The LHA rate that is used in the Housing Benefit calculation will last for 12 months.  If the benefit claim is still in payment at the end of 12 months (which is known as the anniversary date), entitlement will be re-assessed using the new LHA rate that has been provided by The Rent Service.  If the contractual rent changes during the 12-month period (for example, there is a rent increase), this cannot be taken into account until the anniversary date.

Broad Rental Market Areas

Different LHA rates apply to different areas, known as Broad Rental Market Areas (BRMA's), but the whole of Worthing Borough Council's area will be within the same BRMA.  This means that the same monthly rate of LHA will apply to all properties of the same size throughout the borough.

The map below shows the BRMA's for all of West Sussex.

The LHA rate for each property size will be the median rent charged by private sector landlords based on the data collected by The Rent Service.  The median rent is the middle value in the range of data.

Size Criteria

The size criteria for each Housing Benefit claim is based on the number of bedrooms that the customer needs for the size of their household.  One bedroom is allowed for

• Every adult couple
• Every other adult who is not part of a couple
• Any other adult aged 16 or over
• Any two children of the same sex
• Any two children aged under 10 regardless of their sex
• Any other child

A bedroom calculator is available on The Rent Service website to enable you to see what size property would be used in any Housing Benefit calculation.

Single customers

The "1 bedroom (shared)" rate of LHA shown below will be used in the Housing Benefit calculation for

• Most single customers aged under 25, even if they actually occupy self-contained accommodation (e.g. a one-bedroom flat)
• Single customers aged 25 and over who actually occupy shared accommodation

Examples of customers who will have this rate of LHA used in their benefit calculation include

• Joint tenants who are single and share a house or a flat with other joint tenants (e.g. they have their own bedroom but share the lounge, kitchen and bathroom)
• Tenants whose landlord lives in the same property as they do, where the tenant has their own bedroom but shared use of the lounge, kitchen and bathroom

Monthly LHA Rates

The tables below show the weekly and monthly LHA rates from April 2008:

The conversion of a monthly figure onto a weekly basis is x 12 ÷ 52 (e.g. £800.02 x 12 ÷ 52 = £184.62).

Please note that there is no right of appeal against these amounts.  Further details may be found at The Rent Service website.

Further information about Local Housing Allowance can also be found at The Department for Work & Pension website.

Frequently asked questions (FAQ's)

Details of FAQ's about Local Housing Allowance can be found here.

Landlord's frequently asked questions

Details of FAQ's for landlords about Local Housing Allowance can be found here.

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