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Who are End Furniture Poverty?

Campaigning arm of FRC Group, recent Social Enterprise of the Year, created over 30 years ago
Group of registered charities and 100% not-for-profit social businesses
FRC launched End Furniture Poverty in 2015 when we realised nobody was specifically looking at Furniture Poverty.
EFP works to:

improve our understanding of Furniture Poverty
raise awareness of, and to promote solutions to, Furniture Poverty
to ensure that everyone has access to the essential items they need to lead a secure life

We’re part of a group of registered charities and 100% not-for-profit social businesses, Bulky Bob’s, FRC Living, and Buckingham Interiors.

EFP is here to raise awareness of furniture poverty, and to help to develop national solutions to furniture poverty. It really helps that we have the expertise and resource of the wider organisation to draw on when needed but we are an independent campaign.

We do all sorts of things, from guides to help people find essential furniture items, to the research reports we’ve published, such as No Place Like Home, examining furniture provision in social housing and I’ll talk more about that shortly, and two reports examining furniture provision through Local Welfare Assistance schemes.

We also write articles, run campaigns, and work with partners wherever we can to build a stronger coalition for change.

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Furniture Poverty - The inability to afford or access basic furniture, appliances and furnishings that provide a household with a socially acceptable standard of living

Furniture destitution:

A household has none or very few of the basic items needed
In a long-term, chronic situation

Furniture insecurity:

A household has the items they need for now,
If something essential breaks or needs replacement, they will not have the savings to do so
Often moving from one crisis situation to another.

This is our definition of Furniture Poverty and all parts of it are important:

Afford or access: not just about buying furniture with your income – could be access through local schemes or friends / family
Furniture, furnishings and domestic appliances are all included in this definition of furniture
Ability to participate in the norms of society – not just the physical lack of furniture. It’s about what this means in practice – not being able to have friends round, not being able to cook and prepare a meal, not being able to host children’s parties, celebrate Christmas etc

FP is a continuum, there are varying degrees. At one end there is furniture insecurity – where a household has the items they need for now, but if something breaks or needs replacement (e.g. child’s bed or a fridge), they won’t have savings to do this + may move into furniture poverty.

At the other end there is Furniture destitution – where a household has none or very few of the basic items they need and this can be someone fleeing domestic violence, moving from homelessness, or even someone moving from a furnished into an unfurnished property.

We also believe that Furniture Poverty is a chronic problem, not an acute one. If someone is in furniture poverty, or furniture destitution, providing them with the furniture that they need is a great start but will not make all of their problems go away, the issues are usually much more complex. However it can help them to get to a position where they can face their other problems and reach out for support. This is why we now work much more closely with a wide range of organisations to help develop more comprehensive solutions to Furniture Poverty.

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The Essential Furniture Items

Bed, bedding and mattress
Table and chairs
Sofa and/or easy chairs
Wardrobe/drawers
Floor coverings

Window coverings
Washing machine
Refrigerator and freezer
Cooker/oven
TV

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Financial Impact – Poverty Premium

Increased costs to average annual family bills:

Living without a cooker adds £2,100 to food bill
Living without a fridge/freezer, adds £1,365 to food bill
Living without a washing machine adds £1,000 washing expenses
Living with faulty or inefficient white goods adds over £100 to energy bills.

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Poverty and Material Deprivation in the UK

More than one in five of the UK population (22%) are in poverty– 14.5 million people.
4.6 million people are in arrears with at least one bill – average amount owed £1,600
68% of social housing tenants are worried about meeting normal living expenses all or most of the time
Cost of furniture increased by 32% between 2008 and 2020, white goods rose by 17%

And as I’ve said, furniture poverty, along with food and fuel poverty is ultimately about poverty. We are all aware of the current cost of living crisis. There have been significant cuts to social security over the past decade, the impact of the pandemic, the UC cut, Benefits not rising with inflation, with the increase to NI and fuel bills, and rising inflation, the situation is only getting worse, and is likely to remain that way for some years to come.

We know that the use of food banks has shot up, if people can’t afford food, how on earth can they afford to replace a broken cooker or fridge?

Cost of furniture increased by 32% between 2008 and 2020, white goods rose by 17%, and rising inflation, the ongoing impact of Brexit, the pandemic and the war in Ukraine means prices continue to rise rapidly.

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#LivingWithout Report by Turn2Us, 2020

Over 2 million households – 4.8 million people – are living without at least one essential household appliance
1.9 million people are living without a cooker
2.8 million people are living without a freezer
900,000 people are living without a fridge
1.9 million people are living without a washing machine

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The Impact of living in Furniture Poverty

Affects mental health – people feel a real stigma because they are unable to afford essential furniture items.
Affects physical health – unable to get a good night’s sleep, cook and prepare healthy meals
Affects financial wellbeing – people can get into unmanageable debt trying to acquire items, often with high credit
Affects social wellbeing – unlikely to invite family, friends, support workers into home without a sofa to sit on.

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Homes for Cathy Commitment 7

To ensure that properties offered to homeless people should be ready to move into..

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What solutions exist for Furniture Poverty?

Furnished Tenancies
Local Welfare Assistance Schemes - LWAS
Pre-loved furniture
Charitable grants and funds
Affordable borrowing – e.g. credit unions, Fair For You

Of course the best solution would be a decent living wage, affordable housing and an adequate welfare safety net, but in the meantime, these are what we consider to be the broad solutions for furniture poverty.

I’ll talk more about FTs and LWA shortly but just to touch on the others.

One of the charities in our group is Bulky Bob’s, one of the largest furniture reuse charities in the country so we have lots of experience and expertise that we can share if you’re interested in exploring furniture reuse. I would say the quantity of reusable furniture left behind in properties is usually very low but there are some interesting projects out there in social housing if anyone wants ot find out more. We also have the world’s first mattress cleaning machine at our Liverpool HQ – we were on Morning Live on BBC 1 yesterday if anyone wants to see the machine in action.

And we work closely with the grant giving sector. We’re a member of the GMA – The dozen members the GMA give out around £30m of grants between them every year. Demand is sky high at the moment so we’re looking at where the money is going and what can be done to spread the load, working with local authorities to support people in need.

Many of the grant givers are currently reassessing their grants due to the current demand. For some there’s even a waiting list to sign up as a referrer. Others open on a Monday morning and close literally minutes later as they hit their maximum number of grants for the week.

. I’m working with a group of grant givers to create a digital portal which is a single application point for a range of grants, making it much easier for people to make applications to the right charity rather than having to put in 4 or 5 applications in the hope that one is successful. If anyone wants to discuss this further, just get in touch.

I mentioned affordable borrowing on our solutions list. Going into more debt is not something that we recommend so while we recognise it is a viable option for some so we include it on our list, it isn’t something that we have focused on in any detail.

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Local Welfare Assistance

EFP has published two reports examining LWA provision
32 English local authorities have closed their local welfare assistance schemes
NAO report shows that investing in local welfare, creates significant savings to the public purse
Investing £500k can save £9.7m according to Milton Keynes Council

Local Welfare Assistance schemes as I’m sure you know are local authority crisis support schemes. In Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, these are centrally run schemes and relatively well funded. In England, it is up to the local authority to decide whether that run a scheme or not, and the majority are very underfunded.

Our first report, The Postcode Lottery of Crisis Support, published in May last year, found that one in five people lived in a local authority area with no LWAS scheme, where the scheme has closed., and some schemes were no longer providing furniture leaving one in four people living in an area without any LWAS furniture provision. The second report, The State of Crisis Support, showed that in 2020/21 there were 32 local authority areas in England without a functioning crisis scheme. This has left one in four people unable to access a scheme. We are currently analysing the data for 2021/22 and will be publishing the findings in the Autumn,

We need to make sure that end of the covid grants, which meant some local authorities stopped using their own funds for LWA, doesn’t mean the end of LWA in even more areas.

I’ve spoken with several local authorities who have decently funded schemes and they are looking at how many grants they are making to tenants in social housing properties, particularly for flooring. One has even said they are going to stop providing furniture packs to social housing tenants. They are looking for the social housing sector to step up and do more. We passionately believe that everyone needs to play their part. LWA is great for those who need one or two items, but for those who need more, those in furniture destitution, a furnished tenancy is the only way to provide everything that they need. And local authorities want to work together with social landlords

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Flooring

Often standard practice to rip flooring out of properties when tenants move out
Lack of flooring can mean 15% of heat is lost
1.75m sqm of flooring ripped out and disposed of every year in Scotland alone
Impacts on comfort, health and safety, and noise in flats
Flooring so hard to obtain on low incomes

I want to talk about flooring.

We know it is standard practice to rip flooring out of properties when tenants move out. We are told this is for a number of reasons, there may be contaminants in the carpet, fleas for example, it could be dirty, the new tenant might not want it, the floor underneath needs to be checked. But we believe there are two key reasons, it’s quicker and cheaper to just take it out.

The lack of flooring in a property means up to 15% of heating is lost, meaning these homes are much more energy inefficient too.

It has a very negative impact on people’s comfort, their health and safety, (for example elderly or disabled residents are more likely to trip and hurt themselves if they fall, if they don’t have proper flooring and it’s awful for families with young children), and it an also create noise issues in flats. Plus it’s so wasteful.

Recent figures produced by a Scottish housing association showed that 1.75 million square metres of flooring are ripped out and taken to landfill or waste to energy every year from social housing properties - and that’s just in Scotland. An absolute disgrace. And this is often flooring that is provided through the Scottish Welfare Fund. So the taxpayer is paying for flooring to be installed in properties and in some cases it can be ripped out just weeks later if the tenant moves out. Flooring is much harder to obtain elsewhere in the UK. Very few local welfare schemes provide flooring, and few grant giving charities. So why waste what is already there? There are low cost cleaning products and equipment that can quickly deep clean flooring so simple changes to policies and practices can make a huge difference. We hear from families every week, who’ve lived with concrete floors for years, one mother told us her child had brittle bone disease and every time he took a tumble, she feared a hospital trip. This shouldn’t be happening.

Cleaning flooring and leaving it in place for the next tenant will achieve great carbon savings and help people who struggle to afford flooring. We want everyone to start talking about flooring. Local authorities can have significant influence over the social housing sector in their areas, and many of course still have properties.

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Flooring Research Project

Three year research project exploring flooring in social housing
Funded by Longleigh Foundation
Publishing 3 to 5 reports
Examining current offer, best practice, challenges and opportunities
Aims to drive legislative change – and consider funding routes
End Furniture Poverty on Steering Group

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Furnished Tenancies

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Benefits to the Landlord

Better living conditions for tenants, so reduces turnover
Sustained rental income
Reduced void costs
Improve chance of letting hard to let properties
Improved sustainable communities
Support for vulnerable tenants

Here are some of those broad benefits again of a furnished tenancy scheme for the landlord. Better living conditions for tenants can reduce turnover. Of course tenancies can end for a wide variety of reasons but having a furnished home, can make a huge difference. Sustained tenancies means sustained rental income and therefore reduced void costs.

FTs can make hard to let properties more attractive and help to compete with the private rental sector. And those longer tenancies help to create more sustainable communities which can have an impact on safety, reduced crime and better living standards.

A study by EFP, Furnishing Homes, Furnishing Lives, showed that a survey with over 1,500 social housing tenants found that almost half (47 per cent) of them want social landlords to provide furniture directly and a further 36 per cent would like them to help with furniture in a variety of ways. : https://www.endfurniturepoverty.org/furnishing-homes-furnishing-lives

A study by Sheffield Hallam University in 2016 estimated that as many as 50 per cent of new tenants have difficulty acquiring furniture, and tenants frequently took on (additional) debt to pay for furnishings: http://shura.shu.ac.uk/15614/1/Ambrose%20et%20al%20-%20assessment-need-furniture-provision-nihe-tenants(VoR).pdf

And our No Place like Home report explains the damaging mental, physical, social and financial impact of living in furniture poverty so an FT scheme can provide crucial support for vulnerable tenants, something which we know is so important to social landlords

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Benefits to the Tenant

Move into a ‘home’
Likely to stay longer in the property – 2 years plus
Furniture is a key source of debt
Avoidance of ‘easy’ credit, such as rent to own stores or payday lenders
More likely to engage with support services

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Furnished Tenancy Research: No Place Like Home

The report examines:

Why are there so few furnished tenancies in the social housing sector? (only 2% of social rented properties are let as furnished or partly furnished (i.e. floor coverings/curtains) in comparison to 29% of private rented properties)
What furniture support is currently available?
What impact can increased furniture provision can have on the lives of tenants?

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Key Findings

Finding I: Furniture provision has a positive effect on tenants’ lives
Finding II: Tenants and RSLs rely on a patchwork of inadequate options to obtain furniture and appliances
Finding III: The barriers preventing the establishment of more furniture provision in social housing
Finding IV: Furniture provision is likely to improve tenancy sustainability

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Finding I: Furniture provision has a positive impact on tenants’ lives

Tenant and social landlord participants consistently underlined how the provision of furniture has a considerable positive impact on tenants’ financial security, mental health, and their social wellbeing.

They also stressed how these are negatively affected for those living without.

Finding 1 was largely drawn from our tenant interviews although our social landlord participants also had much to say about the potential effects of furniture provision.

There was broad agreement across our interviews with both tenants and social landlords about the positive impact furniture provision can have on the reduction of debt and rent arrears.

Social exclusion was a real issue too. We spoke to tenants who feel they cannot invite their family and friends round to visit them because of their lack of furniture. [Two tenants were parents who hadn’t seen their children in a while because they were lacking furniture].

That reluctance to invite support workers into their home, those who could help with other issues too, means they miss out on vital support.

That issue of stigmatisation came up a lot too – feeling that they judged for their lack of furniture.

Trying to manage day to day living is hard enough on benefits, and we know it’s about to get much harder, let alone trying to put money aside to pay for furniture or white goods. Trying to do so can leave tenants without enough money for food, fuel or rent

Our research shows that for people on low incomes, or those relying on benefits, there are few options beyond crisis grants or furnished tenancies which do not reduce their disposable income.

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Finding II: Obtaining furniture, a patchwork of inadequate options

Referrals to Local Welfare Assistance Scheme;
Applications to local and national grant-giving charities;
RSL’s own internal (but limited) discretionary fund for furniture
In-house and partner furniture recycling projects;
Donations from family and friends
Saving money from benefits payments
Moderate to high interest credit
And furnished tenancies - in the minority by a significant margin

One of the report’s objectives was to find out what support is currently available and we found that there is currently a patchwork. Our interviews with social landlords confirmed our understanding of the support that is available, and also how inadequate it is.

Some of those options are listed here but some of them take considerable staff time to complete applications, and some mean the tenant can be waiting for weeks or longer for items, or not receive items at all if applications are not successful.

RSL participants (without a furnished tenancy offer) told us that they struggle to help people with furniture – it was often ad hoc – as one put it ‘it’s reactive rather than strategic’ another told us they have staff donations but this is unable to sufficiently meet demand.

Only those with a furnished tenancy had everything they needed and the security of knowing that an item can be replaced if it breaks.

Many people don’t know where to start – and speaking to tenants through this research, led to the creation of our Finding Furniture Guides.

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Finding III: The barriers preventing more furniture provision in social housing

General lack of understanding and awareness of how an FT scheme would work, including relevant Govt. policy.
Financial pressures facing the sector.
A perceived ‘Poverty Trap’.

Both FT providing RSL participants and those who didn’t provide them agreed that lack of understanding about the service charge eligibility was a significant barrier.

We know that RSLs have been under significant financial pressures in recent years, however our interviews showed that for those running schemes, an FT scheme is an income generator, but that does take time.

The positive impact on tenancy sustainability reduces void costs, and an FT scheme can reduce tenant debt and therefore improve rent arrears so there are financial benefits to the creation of a scheme.

All agreed that top-down support was vital, and that there is a change in attitude as RSLs recognise that too many of their tenants are living in furniture poverty. We will do what we can to turn that attitude change into the creation of FT schemes.

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Finding III: The barriers – poverty trap?

Tenant participants dismissed the notion of the ‘poverty trap’.

“These people worry about the poverty trap? So they’d rather deprive someone of the basic necessities now because they’re worried about a future that hasn’t happened yet?!” Tina, Tenant Participant

“If they were to move into one of our properties with a full furniture package and they weren’t working, as it stands at the moment, they’d be paying £19.68 a week for that service. If they found work they can return all the items apart from the bed; the charge would go down to just over a pound.”

RSL Participant – FT Provider

There was a disparity between those who did and did not provide FTs with regards to the existence of a perceived ‘poverty trap’.

Non-FT providers saw it as an issue, saying it could deter people from moving into employment because they’d be worried about affording the service charge. However

FT providers said that so long as there is sufficient flexibility embedded within a scheme, it is not a significant problem,

This means flexibility with regards to returning items if tenants later enter work to reduce the service charge. This gives tenants the ability to buy their own items piece by piece while gradually reducing the service charge. We know that this isn’t easy for an RSL to navigate embedding that flexibility whilst still ensuring that the scheme is financially viable but it is certainly not insurmountable and we can help with this, introducing you to RSLs who have done this for example.

And I do think it’s important to recognise that there is a cohort of tenants who realistically will always remain on benefits. For these people, a furnished tenancy can be an ideal solution to furniture poverty.

We also spoke to tenant participants about the poverty trap argument, and overwhelmingly, they did not consider this to be an issue, again, provided that there is flexibility embedded within a scheme. While the number of items people would want from a furnished tenancy varied, there was consensus across all tenant participants that they would at least want to be given the option of renting a furnished tenancy.

In fact, some of the tenants said that trying to find a job when you live in an empty box is just too hard so a furnished tenancy actually helped them to find employment, the opposite of a poverty trap. Not being able to wash clothes for job interviews, the feeling of hopelessness and lack of energy that comes from living without essential furniture can make it extremely hard to motivate yourself to find a job. Those in furnished tenancies said that the knowledge of having a secure furnished home made such a difference to their attitude and happiness, it helped them into employment. Of course we know this isn’t the case for everyone but certainly for some that we spoke to, this was a very positive effect.

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Finding IV: Furniture provision is likely to improve tenancy sustainability

The reasons behind this are closely related to the positive benefits presented in Finding I and the ability to get rest, wash one’s clothes, a reduced feeling of stigma, and the ability to be more financially secure (i.e. because they have not had to borrow at high interest rates to acquire furniture).

RSL staff and tenants indicated that furniture provision is likely improve tenancy sustainability. The reasons behind this are closely related to the positive benefits presented in Finding I and the ability to get rest, wash one’s clothes, a reduced feeling of stigma, and the ability to be more financially secure (i.e. because they have not had to borrow at high interest rates to acquire furniture).

This finding complements a plethora of other reports which have also suggested that the provision of furniture can improve tenancy sustainability.

One tenant we spoke to said: “For people that’s where it all goes wrong, if they’ve got to start going into finance and loans to furnish the place, they can’t keep the payments up on the rent and that’s why a lot of people get evicted.”

An RSL participant said: “If someone stayed in the property for another 6 months then you’ve got an extra 6 months’ rent and you’ve saved £2.5k on a possible void. Organisations need to get away from the concept that it’s a financial risk.”

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How End Furniture Poverty Can Help

We can help you to explore whether a furnished tenancy scheme would be right for your organisation
We can connect you with fellow housing professionals running successful furnished tenancy scheme to share their experiences and expertise
We can help you to prepare a business case for your board
We can help you to measure and monitor the success/impact of your scheme

And now: A Blueprint for Furniture Provision in Social Housing

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Creating a Sustainable Furnished Tenancy Scheme

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Staffing Requirements

We have spoken with RSLs across the UK who run successful FT schemes

Torus has 1600 furnished properties managed by two members of staff

Standard across the sector

A start-up scheme is likely to require one member of staff

Once a scheme is up and running, this should be expanded to two full-time staff members

Typically these would be a:

Furnished Tenancies Manager/Officer
Furnished Tenancies Officer/Admin Officer

A great starting point is to find out what staff structures existing schemes use so we’ve spoken with a number of RSLs with long standing schemes to find out how their schemes are staffed. Of course every organisation is different but understanding the duties that are likely to be necessary can provide a good indicator of the number of staff hours required and therefore the number of staff members.

A new scheme may need a little more time to get the necessary processes and procedures in place but once a scheme is up and running, the standard for a scheme with anything from 500 to 1600 properties is usually two staff members.

And an admin charge is usually added onto the furniture costs in the service charge which will cover these staffing costs.

General day to day duties for FT staff start with liaising with tenants. They need to explain to prospective tenants exactly what an FT is and how it works, the costs involved and the fact they are not ‘paying off’ the cost of the furniture, it is part of the rent. They need to establish whether an FT is right for the tenant and discuss other possible options.

They also need to liaise closely with internal teams, including Voids Team, Lettings/Allocations Team, Tenant support team – such as Money Matters, and of course Finance.

Also asset management and contributing to reports and measurement processes.

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Asset Management

Consider a contract furniture supplier who can deliver all the items needed
Develop and maintain an asset log to keep track of all furniture items
Carry out annual audit of furnished properties
Arrange any replacements or repairs
Arrange for regular PAT testing of electrical items
For larger schemes, consider premises to store returned items so they can be reused

Careful stock or asset management is vital to the success of an FT scheme. First of all you need to select the right supplier to meet your needs. We would recommend using one furniture supplier for all items – build a relationship and then they can do things like arranging delivery without the need for staff to attend

Keep an Asset log – record of how old items are, track when replacements may be needed and also record of repairs to see how often items are being damaged.

An annual audit means you keep track of the items. We know that many RSLs have concerns about items being damaged or stolen but in practice, everyone we have spoken to from existing FT schemes say this is very rare. But checking on items mean you can manage any renewal programme more easily. Good record keeping means you will be able to clearly see if a tenant is needing more regular replacements than standard which could require a conversation about looking after items.

Regular pat testing of electrical items is not a legal requirement although post-Grenfell we do understand why you may choose to do this.

And many of the larger schemes, have their own premises to store furniture that is no longer needed because a tenancy has ended, or a tenant has reduced the size of their package for example. Items could be in good repair and suitable to be installed in another property when it is needed, and you could also use it for furniture reuse, FT items which don’t meet the standards for an FT scheme but which may be suitable to gift to a tenant in need, or reuse of tenant items left in properties.

Premises are usually only necessary when a scheme is well established and of a reasonable size.

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Preparing a Business Case

Need organisational buy-in – from board level down
Need to demonstrate the benefits to your organisation:

Financial – FT schemes are profitable
Social – FT schemes provide vital support to tenants
Sustainability – FT schemes help to sustain tenancies

Fundamentally you need to demonstrate the main benefits – financial, social and sustainability. All of these are key arguments to gain approval.

You need to understand the service charge, and decide how quickly you want to pay off the capital costs of the furniture – too quickly and DWP may not approve the service charge levels, too slow and the scheme may not be sustainable.

You need to decide who you will offer an FT to, what is your eligibility criteria? And what items you want to include in your furniture packages. This is where our essential items list can help.

And then asset management again, do you want a regular replacement scheme or ad-hoc replacements? And what will you do with furniture what a tenancy ends? We can help you can navigate this, also by speaking to those running existing schemes.

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Monitoring & Measurement

Monitoring and measurement can take time but it is a very worthwhile investment

Strengthens initial business case

Demonstrates ongoing scheme benefits for organisation and tenants

Ensures that any future decisions about success of an FT pilot or possible scheme expansion are based on robust data

There are substantial benefits to robust measurement. We recommend that you speak to tenants before you set up the scheme to find out what they may need, what they think about the scheme etc. And then once a scheme is up and running, ongoing interviews and surveys with the tenants in the furnished tenancies.

It will not only help to demonstrate the sustainability of a scheme and its positive impact on tenants, but help you to consider possible improvements to your scheme. Are you including the right furniture items? Is the scheme offering the right amount of flexibility for you and the tenant?

You should gather both quantitative and qualitative data. The quantitative data will include elements such as:

Tenancy duration

Rent arrears

Engagement with housing and support agencies

Void turnaround time

Void costs and losses

And the qualitative data will cover

Satisfaction with their landlord and their tenancy

Mental, physical, and social wellbeing

Levels of household debt

How many are living without furniture and white goods after xx months?

Do they have furniture and white goods?

How did they/will they get hold of furniture?

How long did/would it take them to save up for items?

Did they consider accessing, or have they had to access to credit?

Has not having furniture affected their ability to pay rent?

And as well as speaking to tenants in the furnished tenancies, you need to include a control group. Ideally a group of tenants in a similar area and with a similar background you aren’t in a furnished tenancy so you can make a direct comparison between the groups.

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Financial Planning: Setting a Service Charge

Service Charge needs to include:

Total cost of furniture
Replacement / Repair/ Void Loss costs (40%)
Management and Administration cost (15%)

The total figure breaks down to a weekly cost calculated over 3, 4 or 5 years depending on the length of time you wish to recoup the costs.

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Service Charge Sample Calculation

Service Charge Calculation (Five Years)
Package	Cost
Single Person living/dining Pack	£ 576.26
Double bedroom pack	£ 471.95
Single person electric white good pack	£ 705.10
Total	£ 1,753.31
VAT @ 20%	£ 350.66
Total + VAT	£ 2,103.97
Cost of package over 5 years @ 52 weeks per year	£ 8.09
Replacement and void loss cost @ 40%	£ 3.24
Admin costs @ 15%	£ 1.21
Service charge per week over 5 years	£ 12.54

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Good Practice - Torus

The scheme has been running since 1998, and over that time they have created 5,700 furnished tenancies.
Around 9% of their 15,000 former Liverpool Mutual Homes properties are let as furnished.
“A furniture package can turn a two week tenancy into a two year tenancy and can make a big difference to your void costs.”
“I believe that every social landlord should provide furnished tenancies, even if service charges didn’t exist. It should not all be about profit, we are here to help our customers and furnished tenancies do just that.”

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Good Practice – Stockport Homes Group

Stockport Homes Group provide 565 furnished tenancies and the main driver for these has always been to support tenants to sustain a tenancy.
“We don’t offer just one model of furnished tenancy. Even if someone has been in temporary accommodation, they may have a cooker or a sofa back in mum’s garage.”
“We don’t want an FT to be something they hate and think will be a burden so we make sure it offers what we, and they, need without losing money.”
“We tend to focus on the essential furniture items such as cookers, washing machines, fridge freezers, beds, and flooring. We do offer some storage, such as wardrobes and chests of drawers but we try to steer people towards second hand storage.”

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A Blueprint for Furniture Provision in Social Housing

We want to answer all of the questions that social landlords have about furnished tenancies
We want to understand every barrier and have a solution to every one
How many tenants do move off benefits? What is the right percentage of stock to include in an FT pilot? What are there different ways of delivering an FT scheme, or different ways of funding them?

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Links to Guides, Case Studies and Reports

There are lots of resources on our website, including:

Guides to Finding Furniture
Case studies with Torus and Stockport Homes Group
Guide to Creating a Sustainable Furnished Tenancy Scheme
Visit: https://endfurniturepoverty.org/resources/
Our Furnished Tenancies Research Report, No Place Like Home is here: https://endfurniturepoverty.org/research/no-place-like-home-download/

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Any questions?

For more information about the campaign:��www.endfurniturepoverty.org��Claire.Donovan@EndFurniturePoverty.org�07714 521 062

@EndFurniturePov