Young people are being forced to choose between racking up rent debts and risking their health due to rules limiting what they can claim for housing benefit.

Those under 35 who are now relying on benefit to pay their rent for the first time will find that support will only be available to cover the cost of a room in a shared house.

The National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) is warning that this will force many young renters to choose between building unsustainable debts, with all the anxieties to go with it or, moving into cheaper, shared housing. Apart from forcing people to move home in the middle of restrictions, this could potentially involve living with strangers with all the health risks that this poses during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a letter to the Welfare Minister, Will Quince, the NRLA has called on the Government to urgently adopt the recommendations of the Social Security Advisory Committee and suspend the Shared Accommodation Rate rule. The NRLA argues that this should be for a period of at least a year. 

Ben Beadle, chief executive at the NRLA, said: “It is unacceptable that younger renters are being forced to choose between building debts or compromising their health during a pandemic.”