Liverpool City Council has reduced the average nightly rate it pays for temporary accommodation and significantly cut the number of homeless households placed in hotels.
Around 1,600 households are currently living in interim or temporary accommodation across the city.
Demand is rising in line with national trends driven by no-fault evictions, family breakdowns, rent increases and affordability pressures.
The council does not house asylum seekers, as that responsibility sits with the Home Office.
Cabinet Member for Housing, Councillor Hetty Wood, said:
“The cost-of-living crisis in recent years has led to a huge increase in people needing temporary accommodation.
“In response to that, we are taking proactive steps through a number of schemes to make sure we have enough units of accommodation to give them a roof over their head whilst they find somewhere more permanent, rather than spending months in a hotel.
“We have also negotiated reductions with landlords in the rates paid, to make sure that council taxpayers get value-for-money.”
The council has increased the number of self-contained units available in the city to 1,330, helping to reduce reliance on hotels.
The average nightly rate has fallen from £83 to £57.
Hotel use has dropped to 277 rooms, and no families now spend more than six weeks in hotel accommodation before being moved on.
On 25th April last year, 83 households had been in B&B accommodation for longer than six weeks.
1,500 New Homes to Reduce Homelessness Pressures
Work is underway to deliver 1,500 units of interim, temporary and permanent accommodation over the next 18 months.
The council says this will drastically reduce demand for higher-cost nightly rate placements.
In the meantime, Cabinet members will consider approving a new two-year £40 million contract for an accommodation booking system from 1st April, with the option to extend for a further two years.
The system will manage bookings for interim and self-contained accommodation while procurement of the 1,500 units continues.
Further measures include creating an on-site support service for up to 49 single households requiring low to medium support, making £7.3 million in grants available to private landlords to bring 365 empty homes back into use, and establishing a Housing Solutions hub to manage homelessness applications.
Councillor Wood added: “This is all part of our wider homelessness action plan, which includes bringing empty homes back into use for people who are on the housing waiting list.
“We recognise that there also needs to be an increase in the supply of affordable homes and are working with Government agencies, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and social landlords to deliver affordable rent and rent-to-buy properties.”
