Renting a home
Somer Community Housing Trust (the Trust) owns and manages
around 9,700 homes. The majority of these are in the City,
towns and villages across Bath and North East Somerset. We
also own and manage some homes in South Gloucestershire, Wiltshire
and Mendip.
We aim to provide and maintain a consistently good quality and
choice of housing at an affordable rent. We offer homes
to:
- Single People
- Couples
- Families
- People who need support or extra care to maintain their tenancy
and to live a vibrant lifestyle, e.g. people with physical
disabilities, learning difficulties, mental ill health or other
support requirements
- Our tenants are from a wide age range from 18 years
upwards, we do on occasion provide housing to 16 and 17 years olds
where a guarantor is in place
We do not hold our own waiting list. If you would like to
apply for a Trust home you will need to apply to the Choice Based
Lettings schemes run by the Local Authority in the area(s) you wish
to live in.
Choice-based lettings (CBL)
We have a duty to work with the Local Authorities where we own
homes. Each of these runs a Choice Based Lettings
Scheme. This means if you are looking for housing you must
register with the Local Authority CBL scheme. Once you have
registered you can view the available properties each week and
'bid' on the ones you are interested in moving into. Empty
homes are advertised on their website and in some areas in the
local paper.
The success of your bid will depend on the priority or 'banding'
your application has been given. If there is more than one
successful bidder with the same priority the property is usually
offered to the person who has been waiting longest.
If you do not have access to the internet or would like
assistance with viewing available properties we have the details of
these and computer facilities for you to use at our Local Service
Centres and at the Maltings Office. There are links to the 4
Local Authority schemes that we participate in below if you wish to
apply and look for a new home.
HomeChoice West
You
can now apply to move home to anywhere within the West of England,
through the choice-based lettings scheme, HomeChoice West. The four
local authorities – Bath and North East Somerset, Bristol, South
Gloucestershire and North Somerset – have made an agreement which
means you can bid for homes across the area, even if you don’t have
a local connection (such as a close relative in the area).
From now on, five per cent of the homes available will be
offered to people without a local connection. You will still need
to meet any other criteria advertised for the property, and will
also need to be registered with the relevant local authority before
you can apply.
HomeChoice West fact
sheet
If you would like to know more, you can visit the councils’
websites or call them on the numbers below:
Bath and North East Somerset
01225 396118
www.homesearchbathnes.org.uk
Bristol
0117 922 2400
www.homechoicebristol.co.uk
South Gloucestershire
01454 868005
www.homechoicesouthglos.gov.uk
North Somerset
01934 426708
www.homechoicensomerset.org.uk
Reasons why we may not offer you a property
We are unlikely to offer you a home if you lost your previous
home because you did not pay the rent and still have outstanding
debts, caused anti-social behaviour or did not look after your home
or need additional help and support to manage your tenancy but
refuse to accept the support.
Already a Trust tenant?
If you are already a Somer tenant please click
here for advice about transfers and mutual exchanges.
How many homes do we let?
From April 2009 to the end of March 2010 we let 782
homes. Of the 782 homes 182 were brand new homes that people
were moving into for the first time the remaining 600 were
properties were let after another household moved out. A high
number of the homes that we re-let are flats and sheltered housing
for older tenants.
If you would like more information about finding
a new home or the properties that we own please contact our
lettings team on 01225 366000