Housing Issue and Housing Solution Who the report is directed for Decision/information

The aim of this report is to assist the Riverslake Housing Association to improve the services and quality of life of the occupants residing at the estate managed by the Riverslake Housing Association. The report aims to provide recommendations on the strategy that the Riverslake could employ which include the strategy:

To effectively repair estate,

To deal with anti-social behavior of kids hanging around in the night making the residents to be scared of going out in the night.

To provide recommendation for the effective and efficient timely collection of house rents.

Summary and general Recommendations

Housing issues and the solutions are key issues facing community and residents. The focus of this report is to recommend practical solutions that will assist Riverslake Housing Association to identify good practice in estate management in dealing with the housing issues such as disrepair and anti-social behavior. This report provides the following recommendations to improve quality of life of residents.

First, the report recommends that the Riverslake Housing Association should organize a football training or football competition for the kids to discourage them from hanging around the estate in the night.

Moreover, the paper recommends that the Riverslake Housing should carry out a comprehensive inspection of the house to identify necessary places in the house that require repair and maintenance. The organization should draw up the cost of repair in collaboration of the selected contractors, and Riverslake Housing could raise fund of the repair from their financial resources or approach the tenants and advise them to pay one or two house in rent in advance.

The report recommends that the Riverslake Housing should introduce a reward scheme for tenants who pay their house rent on time. The strategy will encourage other tenants to pay their house rent on time.

Introduction

It is generally agreed that good quality housing is very critical to people well-being, apart from improving health and safety on the occupants, a desirable housing stock assists an individual to achieve a complete state of mental, social, and physical well-being. Riverslake Housing Association manages a number of estates at the Riverslake region. In the UK, the Housing Associations are private non-profit organizations that provide low-cost social housing for people in need of low cost home. (CIEH, 2008).Much of the estate managed by the Housing Associations are designed for specialized people such as young people, formerly homeless, low income earners, people misusing illegal drugs or alcohol. However, the Riverslake Housing Association manages estates designed for low income people in the United Kingdom. (Chartered Institute of Housing. 2009). With the nature of housing managed by the Riverslake Housing Association, the Riverslake Housing is facing challenges to manage the estates effectively which leads to series of complaints from the residents such as lack of housing repair and anti-social behavior around the estate. (Communities and Local Government. 2009). High quality housing depends on the number of factors such as security of the house, and housing condition. However, many of the housing managed by the Riverslake Housing do not meet the quality housing standards in the UK. (CIEH, 2008).

Riverslake Housing Estate Problem

The key issue is that there is high level of complains among the housing occupants at the Riverslake Housing particularly with reference to the quality of housing. Moreover, there is no security at the place; tenants are particularly scare to move out at night because of kids hanging around all the time. Decent home is generally linked to crime reduction; improve employment opportunities, community development and attainment of educational achievement.

One of the solutions to the problem is to involve the residents in the decision making in order to improve the quality of life of the occupants in the estates. Resident participation is the strategy of allowing residents to take part in the decision-making on the housing conditions, housing policies, and housing related services. The strategy is two-way process, which involves sharing of information, idea and power to improve the standard of the housing conditions. One of the benefits of involving the residents in the decision making is to identify all the problems that residents are having in the past and present. Identification of the problems will assist the Riverslake Housing Association to draw out specific solutions to the problems.

Moreover, involvement of tenant in the decision-making will make some of the tenants to deliver professional inputs to arrive at the solutions to the problems. For example, some of the tenants may be professionals in different fields and some may have years of experience in social study and estate management....

Their involvements in the decision-making will assist the Riverslake Housing management to arrive at quick solutions to the problems since some of the tenants will recommend professional solutions to the problems.
Moreover, some of the tenants are parents and understand kid s' anti-social behaviors and the strategies to manage these behaviors. Involving residents in decision-making will reduce kid's anti-social behavior, which will enhance safety of the estate residents and improve the housing standards.

Pawson, Bright, Engberg, et al. (2012) point out that resident involvement in decision making is an official important policy since the 1980s. The resident involvement in the decision-making will assist in passing the right information to the estate management. The strategy will assist in building trust and openness. Moreover, the Riverslake Housing management will be able to tailor their communication in a friendly way to the residents. For example, issues such housing repairs, housing safety and management of kid's anti-social behavior will be dealt with in a friendly manner.

Strategy to Improve the Quality of Estate Services

Effective estate and tenancy management is very essential to deliver high quality services to the residents of Riverslake Housing estate. Estate and tenancy management is not just only by looking after the physical environment and building, however, estate and tenancy management is also to ensure effective tenancy management by providing and arranging support, advice, and assistance for the residents in order to enhance quality of the housing estates through improving existing housing services. The strategy to manage the key estate issues that Riverslake Housing is facing is to identify the priorities that will improve the quality of life of the residents. Identification of the key issues will assist the Riverslake Housing Association to create a sustainable community that will assist in enhancing strategic improvement plan. The Riverslake Housing estate should use different strategies to improve the estate and quality of housing services. Some of the strategies are discussed below:

Estate Inspection

One of the effective strategies to improve the estate is to carry out the estate inspection to identify the key issues and complains. The strategy will assist the Housing Association to implement a comprehensive housing repairs tailored to the needs of the residents. (Basildon Council, 2012). Stewart, (2011) argues that fostering social interaction between customer and estate providers is one of the strategies to improve quality of estate services. Engaging constant social relations with residents will assist the Riverslake Housing Association to identify special concern of the residents and the strategy will assist Housing Association to deliver services tailored to the needs of the residents. (Audit Commission., 2002). Although, the tenants have lodged several complains about low quality of the estates and lack of security around the estate, however, the Housing Association still need to carry out the housing comprehensive inspection to understand all the complain of the tenants. Having listed all the complains from the residents, the next course of action is that Riverslake Housing Association should draft a scale of preference for all complains and deal with the most important housing issues bordering the residents. The Housing Association should draw up a financial planning to deal with complains, and the Housing Association should compare their total financial resources with their action plan.

The Riverslake Housing Association should look for a contractor who will assist the organization to carry out the housing repair. The contractor should be selected based on the past performances and recommendations. In collaboration with the contractor, the organization should draw up the cost of completing the housing repair, which should include the cost of housing materials and manpower. The Riverslake Housing Association should use the available financial resources to repair the necessary place that their financial resources could cover. Moreover, the Riverslake Housing Association could approach the tenants to pay one month or two months of rents in advance in order to cover the cost of repair and maintenance.

Forming Estate and Tenancy Management Team

The management of Riverslake Housing estate should also form an estate and tenancy management team to be in charge of all the tenancy issues. The estate management team will undertake the review of the house and identify the issues that should be addressed by the housing estate. The team should also assist in identifying the registered occupants and the strategy will assist in identifying the housing fraud. Typically, the housing frauds should be eliminated to ensure that only registered occupants are occupying the housing. The strategy will allow the Riverslake Housing estate to spend their financial resources only on the qualified tenants. The team will also assist…