Title: Bad Weather, Good Habits: encouraging social housing tenants to save more
1Bad Weather, Good Habitsencouraging social
housing tenants to save more
- Presented by LemosCrane and supported by Friends
Provident Foundation
2Methodology
- LemosCrane worked with 6 social landlords
- The Wrekin Housing Trust
- CHS
- Hyde group
- Hastoe Housing Association
- Circle Housing Group
- Aster Group
- In-depth interviews with 220 social housing
tenants.
3Background and Policy Context
- Why savings?
- Why social landlords?
- - Business case
- - Financial inclusion and capability
- - Moral case
- Policy Context
- More assertive policy agenda
- Welfare reform and Universal Credit
- Strivers and Skivers
- NEST Defaults, loss aversion and Nudging
- If tenants had savings and were better placed to
deal with emergencies, ultimately we would have
less rent arrears.
4Tenants Lives
- 45 experiencing a challenging situation making
them socially or financially vulnerable - Of these, 66 were living with physical ill
health or disability - 80 between 18-65
- 37 single person households
- 43 had children, and roughly half and half
single parent and two parent households - average income 18,171
5Benefit Status and AttitudesTowards Money
- No significant correlation between benefit income
and attitude towards money
Fully dependent
Receiving some
Not receiving any
6Hobbies and Interests
- The majority prioritise low cost, high
contentment activities - 2 listed shopping as among their hobbies
- 0.5 listed spending money
7Characters, Lifestyles and Perfect Days
day at the seaside
Ill help anybody
Trip to the park with family
Go to a botanic garden read a book and stroll
Relax. Me time
Gardening
Peaceful, surrounded by loved ones
Realizing nirvana
I would describe myself as more of an introvert.
8Major Life Events
- 88 had experienced at least one major life
event during their tenancy, including - Health problems
- Having a baby
- Entering employment
- Redundancy
- Divorce
- Retirement.
9Tenants Worries
Do you have any persistent worries?
- 66 of respondents
- said that they had persistent
- day-to-day worries
- Money was the most common
- worry amounting to 63 overall
- (33 including those without worries)
- 89 of those with persistent
- money worries were not
- regularly saving
10Experiences and Attitudes towards Money
- 67 are mostly getting by with at least a small
amount left over each month
- 55 of respondents were careful savers
11Borrowing
- 61 of borrowers were up to
- date and coping with repayments
- 62 of respondents said they did not borrow
12Future Planning
- 62 said they were in work but not planning for
retirement
- 56 did not know how they would cope with an
unexpected expenditure
13Saving Behaviour
Are you saving regularly?
- 24 were saving regularly
- 33 held some savings
- The majority of savers held up to
- 1,000
- 73 felt they should save more
I would like to save because I would like to
have a money cushion to rely on when its
needed. I have nothing to fall back on if a
disaster was to happen.
14Savings Targets
- Those not regularly saving were just as likely to
have clear ideas of what they wanted to save for
as those who were saving. - I would like to save because I would like to
have a money cushion to rely on when its
needed. - A holiday would be lovely!
15Why are tenants not saving?
- The overwhelming majority say they would like to
save but cannot afford to do so (95) - We dont have enough money to be able to save.
- cant afford to!
- I would like to save eventually but I dont
- have any money now
Do you think you should save more?
16Could tenants save more?
- 67 are managing their money with at least a
small amount left over. - Financial impact of having children includes
having to buy treats etc for kids to take to
school for the class so children feel accepted. - I am sensible but extravagant with my
grandchildren. - We struggle but we do go away once a year.
- Why not saving? Income is too low if we are to
have a holiday.
17How can landlords help?
- 39 said they would welcome their landlords help
in opening a savings account - 47 said they would welcome their landlords help
in joining a Christmas club. - More information to tenants on ways to save.
- Good to have financial advisers - more support
and advice especially for people - in debt/rent arrears.
- Help filling in key forms relating to money and
saving.
18Conclusions
- Stereotypes of social housing residents
- Tenants experiences of and attitude towards
money - Social norm of lifestyle-related expenditure
- Segmentation and landlord involvement
19Tenants more radical suggestions
- Maybe if we paid a little bit more on our direct
debit rental payments that could be saved on our
behalf. - I could pay a couple of pounds more when I pay
my rent that would be put into a savings account.
This would build up over time and I would not
miss it. A small amount would be money that I
would not miss! - I pay a little bit more on my rent account and
this puts me in credit. Even a little bit would
be useful.
20Rent Plus
- Tenants open a savings account, perhaps a cash
ISA, with a supplier identified by the landlord - Tenants make a budget of reasonable expenditure
and identify any surplus cash regularly available
for saving, whether large or small - Tenants opt in preferably at sign up (though it
would be open to all tenants) to overpaying their
rent by a set monthly amount - The money they overpay remains the tenants and
cannot be used by the landlord to clear rent
arrears - The excess on the rent charge is periodically and
automatically swept into a savings account - Landlords can then top up the savings accounts
with cash, prize draws and other incentives. - Tenants can also top up the savings account if
they have surplus cash over and above the regular
amount saved - Withdrawals from the account would be through the
financial services provider in the normal way.
21- Full report available as a PDF from
www.LemosCrane.co.uk