Maintaining Decent Homes

After successfully bringing all our homes up to the Decent Homes Standard in 2010, we are now focussed on maintaining this standard with ongoing planned works programmes. 

The Decent Homes Standard is set by government to ensure that all housing association homes meet certain minimum criteria.

There are four criteria that we consider when planning our Decent Homes Improvement works. These determine whether or not a home is considered ‘non-decent’.

Is your home decent?

In order to fail the Decent Homes Standard your home would fail when assessed against the below criteria.

1. Is your home in an unreasonable state of repair?

To fail this means one or more of the key components (e.g. external walls/roof/windows/ doors/boiler) must be old AND in poor condition or two or more of the other building components (e.g. kitchen/bathroom) must be old AND in poor condition.

2. Is your home without reasonably modern facilities or services?

To fail this means your home must lack three or more of the following:

• a kitchen less than 20 years old
• a kitchen with adequate space and layout
• a bathroom less than 30 years old
• a bathroom and toilet in an appropriate location
• adequate insulation against external noise
• adequately sized and well laid out common areas in flats

3. Is your home without efficient heating and insulation?

To fail a property would not provide a reasonable degree of thermal comfort i.e. efficient heating and effective insulation.

4. Does your home fail to meet the statutory minimum standard set out by the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS)?

To fail this, your property would need to have been assessed and deemed to present a relevant hazard.