Points Changes

Homeless Applicants

  • If you are placed into temporary accommodation, you will be awarded ‘temporary accommodation points’ - 10 points. (However, applicants will not receive any points for sharing, overcrowding or flats without a lift whilst living in temporary accommodation.)
  • Applicants living at The Elms Hostel who have effectively engaged with support workers, have no licence breaches and no rent arrears at The Elms will be awarded 5 points.
  • Applicants who have moved into ‘Move on’ accommodation through The Elms, following a satisfactory move on assessment will receive 10 points.

Sharing kitchen and/or bathroom facilities

A household living in a House in Multiple Occupation (HMO) will be awarded 15 points.

Overcrowding

  • We have reviewed and updated the Dacorum Bedroom Standard to reflect the changes to the Housing Allocations Policy. Some applicants with children may now receive fewer points, but this remains in line with the government’s bedroom standards.
  • At Dacorum Borough Council, we consider overcrowding to occur when an additional person does not have a bed-space, if one bedroom is allocated to each:
  • Married or co-habiting couple;
  • Adult aged 18 years or more;
  • Pair of children aged 0 - 16 years of the same sex;
    and
  • Pair of children aged 10 years regardless of sex.

20 Points per lacking bed space. Any applicants living in a bedsit and who are overcrowded will receive 5 points in addition to those listed above.

Under-occupation

  • 30 points per bedroom if applicant wants to downsize to a General Needs property
  • 50 points per bedroom if applicant wants to downsize to a Supported Housing property

Medical Grounds

  • The policy now includes an additional 75 points for ‘very high medical needs’.

Welfare Grounds

  • The policy now includes an additional 75 points for ‘very high welfare needs’.

Children in Flats

  • We have lowered the age at which we will take into consideration children in flats (first floor and above) where no lift is available from 9 years to 5 years. However, we will only award these points when another housing needs exists.

Pre-Tenancy Training

  • We have removed these points from applications. All pre-tenancy training is now compulsory for applicants aged under 60 years.

Length of time on the Housing Register

  • We no longer award points for length of time on the housing register and have removed these from existing applications.

Management Reasons

  • At the Council’s discretion, housing management can award points as an additional priority. In the rare circumstances that these points will be used, the number of extra points must be agreed by two housing managers.