It will come to no surprise to hear that tenants are facing extremely challenging times right now. It is essential that we listen and act on what really matters to tenants, says David Wilton.
Tenants are currently battling huge rises in energy bills, high inflation and soon will have to face the highest rent rises for over a decade. That is why the findings of TPAS Cymru’s Second Annual All Wales Tenant Survey on Tenant Perceptions are vital for the sector to understand what tenants really want from policy makers in Wales.
Firstly, let’s look at the key findings.
Affordability
There is some positivity from social housing tenants around affordability of rent – 60 per cent reported that they were satisfied with what they pay compared to 54 per cent last year. That positivity is mainly driven by tenants of sheltered or supported living schemes. For younger tenants, self-payers and private renters, affordability is much more of a challenge. Those that reported the highest level of struggle regarding affordability of rent were private tenants aged 18-30.
Whilst social housing rent might be perceived as affordable to some, the number of tenants that are telling us that they are struggling has risen from 29 per cent to 46 per cent. The main reason for this increase is the rising cost of energy bills. Last year, energy costs were barely mentioned by tenants but now it is the single biggest reason why they are struggling this year.
Similarly, private renters are also struggling with rising energy costs, but they are also facing the very real threat of rising rents and they believe that the number of properties available to them to rent are limited.
The interlinked trinity of damp and mould, energy efficiency and a well-maintained home
Awareness and dissatisfaction surrounding damp and mould is rightly a topical issue. We saw strong evidence of tenants being aware of these issues and wanting more energy efficient improvements to their properties.
Perception and timing are key regarding tenant views. Properties don’t become less energy efficient in a year, but due to the increase in energy prices people are far more aware now of their heating costs. They want more energy efficient homes so that their energy costs are lower. For those that have had to use their heating less or at a lower temperature this winter, damp and mould is now a concern when it may not have been previously.
We found that fewer than half of respondents felt that they had a well-maintained home (41 per cent), that their home was free from damp and mould (40 per cent), that it was energy efficient (22 per cent) and that is was in a good community (47 per cent). This should be a concern to everyone in housing.
It was a similar picture for private renters – we saw a drop in those that felt their home was energy efficient (down from 17 per cent to 12 per cent) and only 34 per cent agreed that their home was ‘free from damp & mould’ (down from 40 per cent last year).
Clearly, many of these subjects are interlinked – low perceived scores in energy efficiency, damp and mould and well-maintained properties could be addressed under Welsh Government’s planned WHQS 2 – but the sector needs to find a way forward fast to overcome some of the funding and logistical challenges.
‘Maintenance is adequate, energy efficiency is quite poor and this old building makes this more challenging’
Anti-social behaviour
A common concern amongst tenants’ views on their homes and community is anti-social behaviour. This is something that we regularly hear about at our events and this year’s survey was no exception.
For those in social housing, when asked what was ’the one thing you would change about your community’ the vast majority answered anti-social behaviour. Tenant responses demonstrated a feeling of helplessness and a belief that the landlord was not being supportive of their concern and at times was making things worse by further unsuitable allocations.
Tackling anti-social behaviour is a complex subject with no easy answers, however all interested stakeholders must look at how it can be improved as the data revealed that the majority of tenants feel that not nearly enough is being done to tackle the issues at present.
‘No support from landlord in dealing with anti-social behaviour’
‘Since he was moved in, I have had to call the police a load of times’
Landlord priorities
Whilst many social landlords have ‘tenants at the heart of our organisation’ in their mission statements, is this reflected in what their tenants tell us? What do tenants believe their landlord’s priorities should be and are those landlords listening?
As you would expect, maintenance and repairs are still amongst the most important issues to tenants. Not unexpectedly, next came wanting energy efficient homes – which, as I mentioned earlier, came shooting up the wish list when it barely featured last year. Coming in at third place, was lack of landlord response and support on anti-social behaviour.
Other concerns raised were concerns with landlord/tenant engagement such as tenant voice; service charge transparency and allocations policy.
Private renters shared similar and important concerns with their landlords’ response to maintenance, repairs, and energy efficiency. Where we saw specific private renter divergence was with their desire for more security of tenancy and greater enforcement of landlord regulations (for example, the notice period before visits, correct notice periods etc)
If social housing tenants could change ONE thing in their HOME, what would it be?
- Better energy efficiency
- The desire for more space in home
- Time waiting for repairs
- Remedy garden issues
- Change or update building fabric
- Resolve parking and anti-social behaviour issues
- To fix damp and mould
If private renting tenants could change ONE thing in their HOME, what would it be?
- Energy efficiency
- Updated or changed building fabric/repairs
- Affordability
- To fix damp and mould
- Need more space
Tenants’ views on their community
When we asked tenants ‘What would be the one thing would you change in your community?’ nearly a quarter of social housing tenants wouldn’t change anything. However, the other three quarters identified a number of significant challenges.
As I mentioned earlier, anti-social behaviour was by far the biggest concern for most social housing sector tenants whilst it didn’t feature as highly with private renters – most likely since the social housing sector provide homes for more challenging tenants. When it did it feature, it was wider community concerns than behaviour concerns about immediate neighbours. However, private renters are much more aware and concerned about the impact of second homes and AirB&B as they raised concerns about the impact on availability and affordability of properties. Private renters also raised concerns over community issues such as the lack of green spaces available in communities and parking and traffic issues.
Tenant engagement
It was pleasing to see that for social housing tenants there was a positive uplift in tenant/landlord engagement. In all categories – surveys, events, communications etc from landlords – tenants were satisfied. In terms of engagement, we seem to have fully recovered from pandemic restrictions.
However, I’d like to issue a word of caution when we look at tenant engagement. There is a noticeable difference in engagement within different age groups. Younger people are far less likely to complete satisfaction surveys, attend events and read landlord communications. As a sector, we need to engage younger tenants better and find innovative ways to ensure that their voices are heard.
We found that private renters are logging repairs and maintenance requests at a similar level to those in social housing. However, unsurprisingly we found much lower levels of tenant engagement and communications in the private rented sector. Tenants have a more transactional relationship with their landlords which is consistent with previous private rented sector research findings. Interestingly, a noticeable difference was that there was much more acceptance to engage with a letting agent when compared to dealing directly with a private landlord.
So, what does really matter to tenants? This question is easy to answer – our survey clearly shows us that what matters to tenants is what matters to all of us – decent homes to live in, lower energy costs, a community in which we feel safe and valued and where our landlord listens and responds appropriately to our concerns. Sounds simple doesn’t it.
David Wilton is chief executive of TPAS Cymru
The complete report and a video summary is available from www.tpas.cymru/pulse