Housing Issues and Solutions - Essay Example

 Housing Issues and Solutions Summary This report is created for the management team of the Riverslake Housing Association. The report sets out adequate reasons as to why it would be important to involve residents in the decision making process. It would be a great idea to involve the residents in all matters regarding the best strategies for improving the quality of life and the quality of services provides on the estate. To achieve such objectives, the report identifies the problems facing the Riverslake Housing Association by providing possible solutions to problems such as the provision of examples of good practices as seen in other similar organizations. Such solutions and examples are then applied within the SMART Plan section to formulate possible recommendations. The report is based on thorough studies aiming to come up with viable solutions to the realized housing issues. The problems identified in this case include various aspects such as rent issues, tenant complaints, and complaints regarding the quality of housing repairs. Rent issue mainly involves the rent not being collected in time thereby becoming a major source of problem for Riverslake in keeping financial resources in place. Besides, there are complaints from tenant representatives in which tenants are scared of going out at night because there are always kids hanging around all the time. Another major issue discussed is that there is a high level of complaints particularly about the quality of housing repairs. The residents of one of the association estates are suffering from troubles caused by the lack of maintenance and repairs along with other harmful issues. There is a significant lack of maintenance. The lack of maintenance has generated much disrepair, which has been emerging mainly within the accommodation facilities. Housing professionals are highly concerned with the management of the estate could be depicting some indication of inattention to the problems faced by most of the residents. The result of this practice has contributed to significant suffering amongst the residents of the Riverslake estate due to the housing issues facing the organization. The rent not collected in time has been becoming a major source of problem for Riverslake in keeping financial resources in place. In most case, there are complains that tenants are scared to go out at night because the resident kids have been seen to hang around often. A number of viable solutions to these issues can be established with a collaborative effort from both the management and the residents. Some of the solutions to these issues are discussed in the report. Among the solutions discussed, this report recommends that the participation of residents or tenants in the decision making process of the estate would be a major step in reaching the height of the solutions to all evident housing issues. Some key suggestions regarding the obligation of the housing professionals include the need for training as well as providing education concerning the management of residents and income collection on regular basis. Through, well-structure mutual coordination and collaboration, the housing issues faced by the Riverslake Association can be resolved properly. The paper concludes with the best practices that the property owners have current adopted in the maintenance of maintaining the estate, disrepairs and for resolving the troubles of residents. Thus the best course of action is to have the housing management listen to the tenants regarding the problems they often face. The residents can as well provide feasible suggestions to the housing issues that they are already facing. They can also provide some clue on future perceptions concerning the trends of such issues with respect to the employed efforts aimed at solving both existing and future problems. Recommendations: The housing issues and problems are the major causes of hurdles in the lives of tenants and residents. A quick solution to the housing problems is a necessity and can only be adopted with the mutual collaboration of housing professionals, tenant, residents, and other members of the adjacent communities. Some recommendations for the Riverslake Housing Association, requiring it to take certain steps in order to find the solution to the problems faced by residents of the estate, are given below: How Choices can Improve the Services of Residence The choices, which are made in terms of improving the services of residence, are very critical. With regard to the choices made on improving the services provided to residents, there is the need for both residents and house owners to adopt an approach that is both questioning and open to every individual within the association. A great level of honesty is required in order to achieve the activities designed for accomplishment. Besides, much clarity is required on whether the management of the organization or the landlords have involved the residents in improving housing services or even housing stoke. There is the need to enhance the residents’ accountability to and build strong social capital as well as community capacity. The management and landlords need to communicate their rationale to the tenants or residents while monitoring and evaluating their efforts in comparison to the already set objectives. Residents’ Participation The resident involvement benefits can be taken into consideration by Riverslake Housing Association. There is a clear evidence of the benefits to the residents, business as well as to the wider community. Riverslake Housing Association will have specific gains that include effects on the performance, enhanced accountability and better services. For the residents, the improvements can be of benefit in terms of local community involvement as well as individual capacity building (Communities and Local Government. 2006). Equal opportunities and diversity Offering equal treatment to all the residents would be of great value to the achievement of the strategies discussed in this report. This aspect entails much more than just treating everybody alike. House owners should take the necessary measures to deliver high quality housing services regardless of the level of diversity among their tenants or residents. Diversity in this case includes the existence of various cultures, races, and ethnic groups. Such differences create differences in beliefs, preferences, and attitudes, which raises varying perceptions regarding the housing services provided. The organization’s management and the landlords need to respect the diversity depicted among the residents. Such diversities are likely to be portrayed through their involvement in the decision-making process being proposed. In such a case, all opinions should be considered in terms of their relevance and weight but not based on discrimination. Residents' involvement in decision-making process Participation in the decision making process is one of the major solutions to all the housing problems encountered by residents. Qualified individuals such as a panel of professionals should manage the decision-making process. The panel of professional would conduct meetings for resolving the housing issues and invite the tenants, community members, and residents, who are troubled with issues, to participate in the meeting and file complaints (New Economics Foundation. 1998). The issues of discussion would include the problems inhibiting the provision of quality services, problems of insecurity, and the way each of the problems could be solved. Various ways of formulating a common solution would be discussed. It would be important to invite residents to take part in the decision-making process. They should be invited to participate in the decision-making processes and register their views regarding the policies and procedures that are functioning (Cooper, 1998, pp. 45-80). Accurate record keeping Keeping track of residents could be great, but this would almost impossible given that the management or landlords cannot achieve this. Financial achievements would be significant to the strategies meant to improve the quality of housing services within the residential area. It is thus essential to keep a detailed record of all the financial and legal transactions of the residents or tenants, along with their informal and formal correspondence. Records about the tenants would also provide a way of choosing qualified residents’ representatives from the residents. These representatives would be important in such a way that they would provide information regarding the issues faced by the residents. An account of all the dealings recorded about all the issues dealt with, requests or warnings that are issues, and all the exchanges will be good to be referred to in future (Communities and Local Government. 2006). Techniques for solving problems The techniques aimed at solving the housing issues/problems should begin by improving services and housing stock. The panel of professionals should also aim at enhancing accountability to the residents as well as building social capital and community capacity. In any aspect, the panel professionals need to communicate their opinions to the residents and keep track and evaluate their efforts towards achieving quality life within the housing association. This should be done at both the informal and formal levels. At an informal level, a written or verbal request or usually a polite warning may be issued for matters of unreasonable dirtiness or property damage. It will enable the resolution of dispute between the resident and professional on a positive note. Handing over the house with good repairs In order to avoid the issues of disrepair and external problems, the law requires the housing associations to hand over a property in good working order to the tenant. The tenants is also responsible to keep the property in good condition and nor neglect it in any way. The problem The problems associated with housing are varied and may affect different residents in various ways. In overall, there is low awareness regarding the costs and benefits extracted from the involvement of residents in the decision-making process. These aspects make the residents themselves ignore the need to participate, but the results of all these constitute the problems they face. Their attempt to demand quality-housing services are usually declined. The past few years have witnessed key shifts in the landscape of housing, resulting from a great deal of hard work and innovation done by housing providers. The professionals working at Riverslake Housing Association have been facing challenges of increased demand from people or tenants in terms of higher support levels. The old and disabled require further support by the housing professionals, and in many situations, the vacuum created by the withdrawal of other services is not filled properly. An example is a situation whereby the physically challenged people are left out in many cases. The designs of housed may not provide the structures supporting their physical attributed, an aspect that make them face difficulties in using certain housing facilities. Sometime it reaches a point of receiving threats from landlords once the tenants pose some complaints. In other case, security is so weak such that the lives of many people are at risk. The professionals in this case would definitely face many problems associated with stress, fear, and mental pressure, which may cause problem in generating a meaningful solution to the problems. With the increase in commercialism, the housing professionals are faced with the challenge of moulding their approach more towards commercial mindedness.  It has become necessary for them to understand the basics of customer service and marketing along with supporting the tenants regarding their housing. It is believed by housing professionals that it is vital to maximizing income in an effort to deliver services continually and make investments in existing and new homes. Besides this, studies have shown the breadth of services and diverse housing roles that the tenants expected the housing professionals to deliver. In order to respond to the customers in a better way, the housing professionals are required to disturb their rest, disrupt routine and even quit social life to help the tenants of the estate. Working together for a diverse set of residents with different social and physical needs has been proving to be a tough challenge for the housing professionals in Riverslake Association. The primary obstacle in efficient and better delivery of services is the absence of residents in decision-making process. There is least, or almost no, customer collaboration with supplier of housing services in the Riverslake estate. There is a high level of companies regarding the bad quality of housing repairs and, it is on an increase with passing time. Moreover, the income collection levels in the Riverslake estate are low clearly depicting the inefficiency, and ignorance of the professionals towards the estate. Proper measures will have to be adopted in order to improve the service delivery in Riverslake estate. Solutions The housing associations in the United Kingdom provide complete solutions for housing management including all the essential functions to provide for the complete residence agenda. This comprises of a complete person and property database, allocations, waiting lists, accounting, development project management, service charges, and responsive as well as cyclical and planned repairs (Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. 2006).  The Riverslake Housing Association should fulfil operating stand-alone or integrated requirements of direct labour organisations. They provide customer services with increased efficiency in housing and empower tenants by involving them in decision-making process. The current practices in Social Housing Management in UK and related to the solutions to the problems of Riverslake Housing Association have been explored in the next section: Good Practices Mobilized Workforce The Riverslake Housing Association can utilize automated services with an integrated management solution for housing repairs to both contractor and clients in order to enhance the responsiveness, and efficiency of planned, cyclical, and responsive works. This software includes various extensive mobile modules in order to enhance the repair operative productivity through automation of recording and requesting the details of work outside. The software and automation is used for the purpose of highways maintenance, supervision of building repairs, street cleansing, refuse collection, gas servicing and building cleaning, and grounds maintenance, besides numerous other additional functions. Such housing associations usually receive benefits of reduction in travel costs and time along with higher operative productivity, enhanced customer service, boosted efficiency in business, and increased employee satisfaction. Moreover, the automated process of appointment results in effective management of resources and availability of advanced information regarding the management. Thus, a mobilized workforce leads the organization to build strong relationships with customers and employees and reap the benefits of automation and time saving. Anti-social Behaviour The stronger communities are created through the elimination of anti-social behaviour in the society. Through regular 'face the people' sessions, the housing associations guarantee the establishing of a society on good practice and promotion of dialogue between local services and local people (TSA. 2010). These sessions open with questions and answer between people, and are open to the community groups and local media. One of the major reforms for the elimination of anti-social behaviour is the neighbourhood-policing concept, which is a newly introduced police service in order to bring the local authorities, police and the public in contact with one another.  An additional 18,000 officers of the police community support have been deployed on street. The organizations practicing social housing management have succeeded in developing a case management solution in a comprehensive manner leading to proven results. This is designed for enabling the organisation deal successfully with all types of the existing complaints of Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) from the customers (The Scottish Government. 2009). The entire process is followed from the initial recording to the proceedings and action taken at court. The organization is facilitated with the ability of managing all such cases of anti-social behaviour through capturing major information and data regarding the complaint about the viewpoint of the perpetrator, complainant, actions, ASB category, and location, with the assistance of the utilization of Workflow, CRM, & Electronic Document Management. This strategy put into place results in reduced cost of training people, improved customer service, and avoidance of irrelevant and unnecessary complexity. It is essential to train the staff dealing with anti social behaviour so that they can deal with such complaints in a more effective manner by prioritizing them on a harm-cantered approach. The welfare and support needs should be identified and fulfilled at the earliest. The vulnerability of the complaints regarding anti social behaviour should be assessed at the earliest time possible through the Risk Assessment Matrix (CIH, 2013). This should be done to help in realizing a problem earlier enough before it breaks into a housing disaster. The outcome of the Scottish Government’s review presented strategies on the prevention and protection from anti social behaviour. One of the strategies for steering people away from hanging out uselessly and involving in ASB focused largely on provision of sports, entertainment and other activities along with education. Income Collection Rent management is an important aspect of housing in the management of social housing. It constitutes the income collected by landlords or housing association from tenants. The best practice of housing management constitutes the formulation of formal policy for rent and arrears collection backed by procedures that are clearly documented (Audit Commission. 2003). They are subject to improvement and review on a regular basis by prioritizing the collection of rent. The management teams of The Riverslake Housing Association and their members need to provide an extensive support and leadership to the staff responsible for the implementation of procedures regarding arrears including evictions (Communities and Local Government. 2006). Moreover, the support staff is instructed and trained to perform their job in an effective manner. The rent arrears and recovery of dues in terms of overpaid housing benefit are maintained separately through the rent accounts of either tenants or other ways (TSA. 2010). One of the other ways for managing the rent collection is to levy the bedroom Tax, which is also called as under occupancy charge sometimes. The bedroom tax refers to the replacement of a Housing Benefit Entitlement, which means that the tenet shall be entitled to obtain less in terms of housing benefit if they reside in a council property or a housing association, which supposed to have adequate room even for visitors. This new tax will contribute more towards the income collection and management system. Not only this, but the tenants should be segmented according to their ability’ to manage the level of anxiety and money about their shift to a new system of benefits. There is an improved connection system established between tenants, housing professionals, and authorities dealing with the matters of income collection thus ensuring a proper communication system. Such connection is critical especially when it comes to finding solutions to the housing issue. Avoidance of Racial Harassment The social housing managers follow the basic practices of adopting standardized definition of racial incidents and harassment. They participate and join various multi-agency platforms on the subject of racial incidents and harassment in all those estates where they possess considerable housing stock (Department of the Environment, Local Government and the Regions. 2001). It is essential for the front line to be familiar with the services for providing support to the sufferers of racial incidents in local areas. Moreover, in order to prevent such incidents from occurring, the tenancy agreements of social landlords already contain clause, which particularly bans the undertaking of any racial harassment incident. They are required to work in collaboration with the various other local agencies for identifying the local trends of racing incidents, mapping them out and detecting the 'hot spots'. According to the best practices code, the social landlords are required to make use of 'target-hardening' measures for the protection of vulnerable and aged tenants within the premises of their houses. Social landlords are required by the standards to exhibit leaflets and posters in the statement of their commitment and dedication of dealing with the incidents of racial harassment along with the action they intend to take for giving information to victims and deterring the perpetrators involved in crime (Seager, Jefery, 2010). They also provide support and confidence to the victims and give them courage to report incidents of racism. The SMART Plan The issues faced by the Riverslake Housing Association will be solved using the 'SMART' objectives as follows: Specific The housing officers will form a list of objectives to be achieved. The specific objectives will be: 1. Focusing on the income collection from tenants 2. Resolving the complaints/ issues faced by the residents of estate (for example tackling with anti-social behaviour, dealing with disrepairs, etc.) 3. Reducing communication gap between residents and housing association Measurable The objectives will be measurable. This means that the tenants' complaints should be reduced after the problems are resolved. Income collection should reach the monthly targets. Any other problems should be resolved. Achievable The objectives set previously will be achieved through the following way: 1. Residents' participation in the decision making process, 2. A fixed amount and date of rent collection 3. Making use of technology in maintaining tenants' record 4. Solving tenants' issues just as the complaints are filed Relevant The objectives or goals need to be relevant according to the situation. The housing managers or concerned authorities should allocate sufficient amount, technology and people to solve the problems faced by tenants just as they occur. A working team needs to be established for this purpose. Time-Oriented The goals should be time-driven. For instance, rent needs to be collected regularly at the end of every month. Complaints and grievances should be resolved just as they are filed. Estate should be managed and the condition regarding problems and managerial negligence be reviewed twice a year. SMART Plan for the Issues faced by Riverslake Housing Association 1. ACTION The key action in this case should be based the idea behind generating meaningful solutions to the already existing problems as well as preventing future housing issues within the organization. The basic goal of the landlords is to achieve maximum financial gain, but the tenants and residents want to achieve high quality. The rent collected from the residents/tenants should be partly used to instil these developments. That rent should be in accordance with the rent multiplied by the number of houses occupied by tenants at the end of every month and within a similar duration; issues requiring financial solutions should be resolved from the same rent. BY WHEN Income collection is low at Riverslake Housing Association. This means that it requires to be increased for the achievement of the set objectives. The income will thus be improved by October 2014 in order to meet the financial needs of the estate. BY WHO A team responsible for rent collection every month leads the project. The finance department of the estate on the other hand will make use of software and other technological resources to record the income collected each month. THE OUTCOME Monthly reviews will be made about income collection and debts. The defaulters will be warned if rent is not paid for two months. In this way, 50% of the defaulters will be reduced. 2. ACTION Riverslake Housing Association housing disrepairs need to be identified and eliminated just when they are complained about. All installations, such as faulty water pipelines, and problematic or unfinished wirings will be fixed properly. BY WHEN Issues of faulty fixtures and infrastructure should be fixed with the specified time. All repairs regarding faulty electricity, poor installation of water pipelines will be fixed by August 2014. BY WHO The project will be implemented by a team of workers who will be formed and kept functional for the solution of problems just when they arise. Resources will be made available when needed and the goal shall have to be obtained immediately. THE OUTCOME Regular check-ups for tenants' houses should be done. There should be a review process of all complaints at the end of every two months so that regular feedback is obtained. The complaints will be reduced within the period of next 5 months. 3. ACTION Riverslake Housing Association will provide Kids with parks, farms and other entertainment areas nearby for playing. This will include football and other sporting activities BY WHEN The project will be completed by October 2015. BY WHO The project is led by the Head of Resident Involvement whereby residents' participation will be ensured in order to discuss their problems THE OUTCOME The ASB incidents will lessen by 10%. Bibliography Audit Commission. 2003. Local authority rent arrears management. London: Audit Commission. Web. Accessed on March 27, 2014 Birchall, Johnston. 1988. Building Communities the Co-Operative Way. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. CIH, 2013. How to manage anti-social behaviour cases effectively. Chartered Institute of Housing. Web. Accessed on March 27, 2014 CIH, 2014. Tackling anti social behaviour in Scotland: challenges and responses: A practice briefing from CIH Scotland. . Chartered Institute of Housing. Web. Accessed on March 27, 2014 Communities and Local Government, 2006. Empowering Communities, Improving Housing. London: CLG Communities and Local Government. (2006). Guide on effective rent arrears management. HMSO. Web. Accessed on March 27, 2014 Cooper, C. (1998). 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