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Home improvement grant

Home Improvement Policy

We can support owners, occupiers, and tenants with essential repairs.

What are the eligible works?

Works of repair or improvement to bring the home to the Decent Homes Standard:

1. Works to make a property free from Category 1 hazards. This may include non-structural items, such as windows, doors, and electrical or gas systems.

2. Works on key components of the property, particularly where they are in disrepair due to age. Key components include:

  • external wall structure
  • lintels
  • brickwork and wall finish
  • roof structure and covering
  • chimney stacks
  • windows and external doors
  • central heating gas boiler
  • electrical supply system 

3. Works to provide modern facilities or services. This applies where three or more of the following are lacking:

  • a kitchen that is more than 20 years old
  • the kitchen has inadequate space and layout
  • the bathroom is more than 30 years old
  • if the bathroom/WC is not in a suitable location

4. Works to provide affordable warmth through improving heating or insulation, such as:

  • works to cover the provision of central heating for the first time
  • improvements to an existing central heating system
  • appropriate roof insulation and wall insulation (where applicable)
  • floor insulation to park homes:
  • upon completion, the dwelling must have at least 200 mm of roof insulation (where practicable), cavity wall insulation (where applicable), and an effective heating system.

5. Work may include removing hoarding materials. This is to assess damage to the property. It is also to make the home suitable for hospital discharge work.

Who is eligible for assistance?

  • applicants must have lived in the dwelling as their only home for the past twelve months.
  • applicants need permission and must be responsible. Tenants with repair duties can get help for repairs, upgrades, or changes.
  • the property must be in Council Tax Band E or below.

Amount of Grant

Financial aid for affordable warmth work will be limited to £6,000. Assistance will be limited to £12,000 for other works. Applicants will have to satisfy a means test. Grants are to be repaid upon the future sale of the property. No interest is charged. A maximum £6,000 grant will apply to houseboats and mobile homes. They have much lower equity, and a charge on the land cannot be applied.

The maximum grant is £12,000 and applicants have to satisfy a means-test.

How can Care and Repair help

Care and repair will first send you a means test. You must complete it to see if you are eligible for support. Home Improvement Policy will accompany this - Summary of assistance. If you have difficulty completing forms, please let us know.

A Care and Repair surveyor will visit your property to assess needed repairs or improvements. If suitable, they will create a work schedule. We will arrange to tender to contractors. We will oversee the work until it is satisfactorily completed.

If you fail the means test, we may be able to help. We can offer you a Home Trust Loan through Parity Trust, a third-party social provider. It is for repairing or improving homes that are ineligible for grant assistance.

Waverley Borough Council offers a similar grant. Contact us for more info or check WBC website.

Care & Repair (Home Improvement Agency)
Guildford Borough Council
Millmead House
Millmead
Guildford
GU2 4BB

Tel: 01483 444476
Email: Careandrepair@guildford.gov.uk