Homeless soldiers (Homelessness and street begging)

Name: scuba_angel

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Product:	Homelessness and street begging
Date:	18/06/07 (82 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: just a thought or 3

Disadvantages: you decide

Ok alot has been said over the last few days here about homelessness and begging, one point I am yet to see raised is the frightening thought that many of the homeless are actually former members of the armed forces.

Now these are people who have had a job which is too care for our country but for whatever reason have since fallen on hard times. As I am an army girlfriend and former NAAFI employee I have seen up close the army lifestyle, the single soldiers are given 'block' accomodation consisting of a room and shared toilet/shower facilities, along with a communal lounge area (though I have been told that some dont have the lounges). They pay minimal rent for this and in many cases the accomodation is fairly poor quality. But there is no feeling among those staying in these blocks that it would be worth their while buying property on civvie street.

There are many reasons for this, that they would own a property which would stand empty for much of the year is one huge one after all an empty house is a target for thieves and squatters. But renting has its own pitfalls. After all for a squaddie who is on leave where can they go if not to their home? To the homes of friends and family, so if they must continue to do so where is the benefit of buying?

If they chose to buy a property near their base then they would do so with the knowledge that they would only be there for around 3 years before posting and the hassle of buying and selling property makes this unattractive to many.

Of course for a married soldier the MOD has 'patches and pads' the married quarters, these are homes rented to the couple for which the rent is minimal (in one area a 4 bed house was costing £350 a month, where a civilian could rent a 2 bed flat for the same amount). Again why buy a home and deal with the hassles of selling every 3 years when you can live in and the MOD will contribute to your removal costs?

Overall the facilities in place and for want of a better phrase the employment conditions, make the purchase of property unattractive to many. This combined with the fact that service personnel are not a priority for housing associations means that while many married service personnel will recieve association homes after leaving the forces (after all they often have children and couples are more of a priority than a singe person) a single person will be at the bottom of the list, and if they have not arranged a job on exitting their service they may find that they cannot afford to rent a home for long, and eventually wind up another homeless statistic.

As far as I am aware there exists no way for the few who do consider the purchase of property to use a central agency to help them to buy/sell between postings nor to rent a home. If such an agency were to exist it may be more attractive to them to buy somewhere in the knowledge that they can get assistance at times. In my view such an agency could not only help with the sale of an old property, possibly even providing bridging loans to buy a one at a new location while the old one is still on the market, as well as acting as a central rental agency in the case of properyy near the camps or bases advertising to the forces community for tennents and when further away renting to civillians. Of course that could not solve all of the problems associated with buying a property but it could help to alleviate some of the concerns which (certainly in my other halfs case) have prevented people from investing.

As far as civillian homelessness goes there are also a myriad of reasons for it and there can be no single solution, but even providing a solution to one person is a step in the right direction.

Summary: Ex Service Personnel make up a lot of the homeless in Britian