What constitutes rent in extra care housing for HCA purposes?
We would like to hear from you if you have experience of determining revenue costs in extra care and whether, for the HCA’s new Affordable Housing Programme, rental income can include service charge costs? Without the latter some key elements in extra care would not have funding as rent alone would not cover the costs.
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A good way to look at it is what might be covered by Housing Benefit as part of rent/service charge. We've started to look at this and it's a bit of a minefield.
Its also potentially open to interpretation of the incredibly complex HB regualtions....... We found the attached useful as a starting point.
Associated files and links:
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Housing Benefit table.docx
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I understand that the HCA is working with RICS to develop some more valuation guidance particularly for properties that have few if any comparators on the open market.
I know this thread is a year old, but in case anyone is still looking for this information, the HCA has a couple of paragraphs in the Capital Finance Guide which clarifies that affordable rent calculations are made inclusive of service charge, and further that "For this type of property the market rent comparables (including service charges) should be based on similar levels and types of service provision available in that area" CFG 2.2.4