If you are having difficulty keeping up with your regular weekly rent payments, it is important that you contact your Housing Income Officer as soon as possible. This should be done before the level of debt gets to a high level and we have to take legal action to recover the debt.

If you do not pay your rent, do not keep to any agreement to clear arrears or do not respond to our letters/visits/calls we will commence legal proceedings to repossess your home. If we have to take you to court, you could end up paying court costs in addition to the debt.

If you have rent arrears of over £350 and have not maintained an agreement for more than 12 weeks, you will not be considered for a transfer, and you may be asked to give up any garage you may be renting and you may lose your home as well.

What to do if you have trouble paying your rent

Above all, please do not ignore it, the problem will not go away on its own.

Call our rents hotline (which is free from any landline) on 0800 6335 548 to talk about your rent payments. You can also see us in person at the Council offices, but please call to make an appointment first. If you call in without an appointment you may have to wait until an officer becomes available. If you have difficulties getting to Loughborough for any reason we can visit you at your home at an agreed date and time.

We can help you by:

discussing suitable payment arrangements that will allow you to pay off your rent arrears to Charnwood Neighbourhood Housing
advising you how you may get more money by claiming all the benefits you are entitled to and could be missing out on
giving you debt advice through our tenancy support team and by using our Money Management Self Help Guide
referring you to a specialist agency if you have multiple debts.

We do not recommend that you borrow more money to pay off what you already owe as you could end up in serious difficulties.