Skip to content
Menu

Losing your home

Finding yourself with nowhere to live or the risk of being made homeless is both frightening and stressful. Our housing options officers are here to help you avoid some of the worry of this difficult situation and find a way forward.

It is not always possible to prevent you from becoming homeless, but we can offer advice and support on finding alternative accommodation.

Find out more about our homeless strategy.

Let us know as early as possible

If you’re threatened with homelessness our officers will help and intervene as early as possible. 

If you’ve been made homeless as a result of a crisis, for example due to a house fire or domestic violence, use our out of normal office hours contact system. The contact number for this service is 01636 650 000 – listen to the message and select Option 5.

For anything else, access the housing options wizard as soon as you can, where you can share the details of your situation. You’ll then be offered tailored advice and a personal housing plan. This should give you a number of solutions to help you solve your particular problem.

If the solutions suggested do not resolve your housing difficulties, or having exhausted these you have not managed to successfully secure accommodation, please do not suffer alone and contact us on 01636 650 000 or email customerservices@newark-sherwooddc.gov.uk for help and advice.

We particularly urge privately rented tenants experiencing problems with their tenancy to seek help at the earliest opportunity. 30% of tenants become homeless locally. This is for a range of reasons including difficulties in paying rent on time, disputes over the condition of a property and notice being served on them to leave their home.

Finding a new home will depend on:

  • what you can afford
  • how quickly you need your new home
  • where you want to live
  • how long you want to be there

Additional housing advice

If you have a particular homelessness or housing situation the following leaflets may be useful to help guide your next steps:

Additional sources of independent, confidential and impartial housing advice are:

Citizens Advice 
Shelter

Both organisations have information available their websites and telephone advice services.

Financial advice

On our Financial advice for residents page you will find a list of organisations that can provide information and help with managing your money.

Duty to refer

The Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 reformed England’s homelessness legislation. Part of this was the introduction of the duty to refer, requiring specified public authorities in England to notify local housing authorities (LHA’s) of service users who they think may be homeless or threatened with becoming homeless in 56 days.

The public authorities subject to the duty to refer are (in England only):

  • prisons
  • young offender institutions
  • secure training centres
  • secure colleges
  • youth offending teams
  • probation services (including community rehabilitation companies)
  • Jobcentres in England
  • social service authorities (both adult and children’s)
  • emergency departments
  • urgent treatment centres
  • hospitals in their function of providing inpatient care
  • Secretary of State for Defence in relation to members of the regular armed forces

The referring authority must have the service users consent, as well as asking which LHA they would like to be referred to.

Read more about the duty to refer on the government’s website and in our Duty to refer information (PDF File, 278kb) leaflet.

To make a referral, agencies and partners need to register with Housing Jigsaw. You only need to register once, then retain a copy of your user name and password for future referrals.

Concerned about someone sleeping rough?

If you’re concerned about someone sleeping rough, send an alert to StreetLink. The details you provide are sent to the local authority or outreach service for the area in which you have seen the person, to help them find, connect with and support the individual.

RealHome

Matching potential tenants with privately rented properties. Call us on 01636 650000 to access this service as a potential tenant or visit our RealHome page for more information.

If you’re homeless, or likely to lose your home, and cannot find the bond that landlords usually need, you may be entitled to help under the rent deposit scheme.

Housing authority processes and legal requirements

The Housing Act 1996 and its subsequent amendments including the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 contain specific legal requirements for both the local housing authority to follow and also for customers who may be dissatisfied with the decisions the authority has reached/followed.

Below are links to information which provide advice on these requirements and explains the processes and legal requirements for relevant parties to follow.

Homelessness Prevention and Rough Sleeper Strategy 2024 – 2029

Our vision for Newark and Sherwood is to create an environment where people lead safe and healthy lifestyles, ensuring suitable housing for all. At the heart of this is our aim to break the cycle of homelessness by ensuring the causes are identified at an earlier stage and prevented where possible.

This Strategy sets out the key priorities and objectives to respond to the challenges ahead, reduce homelessness and the impact of homelessness in Newark and Sherwood and subsequently support the Council’s Strategic Priorities. You can read more about the Strategy on our website: Homelessness Prevention and Rough Sleeper Strategy 2024 - 2029. 

Homelessness interagency forum

The Homelessness Interagency Forum meet four times per year and is jointly run by Newark and Sherwood, Ashfield and Mansfield District Councils. Local organisations are encouraged to attend as the aim is to review and develop our Homeless Strategy Action Plan by discussing local homelessness issues, sharing solutions and identifying any gaps in provision.

If you wish to attend the forum, or would like a copy of the action plan, please contact us.