Residents living in social housing properties in Nottingham have shared what life is really like living inside them.
Mixed responses have been given, with comments ranging from ‘excellent’ and ‘brilliant’, to ‘bad’ and ‘grim’.
Nottinghamshire Live ran a survey asking people if they live or have lived in social housing in Nottingham, how they’d rate it and what it’s like living in social housing.
Of the responses that included details of who their social housing provider is or was, all but one of the responses came from residents living in, or have lived in, a Nottingham City Homes property.
It should be noted there are a number of different social housing providers across Nottingham.
One of those submissions was from Cynthia James, 59, who lives on Abbotsford Drive in St Ann’s, an area of Nottingham she has lived in all her life.
Cynthia is also head of Ganes, a resident community group for people living in St Ann’s.
She said a number of residents have shared issues within their Nottingham City Homes properties in the area.
“Residents have said to me before about noisy neighbours as an example.
“I’m very fortunate in that I have connections where I can get necessary work done, but not everyone has that.”
Another of those responses was submitted by Artur Scibor, who has lived in a flat on Colston Road in Bulwell for 12 years.
He said: “We want to leave the flat as the condition of it is terrible.
“The boiler and heating have not been working for weeks, and we’ve also got problems with other residents dumping their rubbish near our flat which then starts to smell.
“People come through the flats, usually young people, smoking weed and breaking windows.”
Other comments from past and present Nottingham City Homes residents include: “The area is OK but the flat I live in is of very poor quality and standard. The standard of service from the service provider is very poor.”
Another says: “The big problems are when you need repairs doing, it can take a long long time for anything to get done.”
One says: “I have lived in social housing all of my life, with different councils around the country. Nottingham City Homes is the best landlord by far.”
Another says: “Some good neighbours, and repairs are excellent.”
A Nottingham City Homes spokesperson said: “We manage more than 27,000 homes in the city and we regularly survey our tenants for their views and satisfaction runs at nearly 90 percent, plus we will follow up anything they aren’t happy with, if it is within our responsibilities.
“We take any complaints seriously and we will always try to resolve issues.
“We would encourage anyone with concerns to contact us directly so we can be of assistance.
“We also have a number of home improvement programmes currently happening across our homes – including energy efficiency works to help improve the warmth of properties.
“Our teams work daily and overnight in emergencies to resolve housing issues for residents.”
Source : Nottinghampost
