Home Improvement and Adaptations

Private Sector Housing provides a wide range of services to help improve and adapt your home. Their specialist Home Improvement Agency team can provide support and guidance for all home improvements and adaptations.

Herefordshire Council Home Improvement Agency (You at Home)

The Herefordshire Council Home Improvement Agency (You at Home) was established by Herefordshire Council in 2005 to help homeowners and private tenants remain safe, secure, comfortable and independent in their own home.

The team includes surveyors, handypersons, administrative staff and caseworkers with considerable experience helping homeowners and private tenants arrange home repairs, adaptations or improvements that have enabled them to remain warm, safe and secure in their own homes. The Agency has been awarded the Foundations National HIA Quality Mark demonstrating a quality service in the following areas:

• Handyperson service
• Funding for Repairs and Adaptations
• Support for Choice
• Connecting with Health
• Major Adaptations

Customers can be assured that the Home Improvement Agency will offer them help and guidance every step of the way.

Handyperson Service

If you do not have the resources necessary to make small repairs and improvements to your home the Handyperson team may be able to help.

The work you request must be for safety reasons or to stop you from being evicted by your landlord and can include things like fixing blinds and curtains, repairing or installing handrails, minor plumbing repairs and fitting window and door locks.

The team can also help with small adaptations such as ramps, half steps, hand rails, home safety and security work, and a wide range of small repairs to help you remaining independent or to ensure you can return home from hospital.

The Handyperson service has been Trust Mark accredited. Trust Mark is an initiative between government, consumer groups and industry designed to protect consumers from rogue tradespersons and help people find reputable firms to do repair, maintenance and improvement work inside and outside the home.

Even if the Handyperson team cannot help directly, they may be able to refer you to someone who can offer assistance.

Kick Start

Herefordshire Council has had a long history of providing grants to local people to improve their homes.  With fewer resources however, it has become increasingly difficult to fund the amount of improvements necessary to really help people in the way the Council would like to.

The discretionary major repair grants will no longer be available from the end of March 2009 and financial assistance will only be available for small scale emergency repairs.

Herefordshire Council joined 'The West Midlands Kick Start Partnership' in 2009.  The aim of the partnership was to support low income and vulnerable homeowners by offering them a range of quality and customer focused housing assistance solutions, including a variety of loans, to help with home repairs and improvements.

Unfortunately, Government funding for Kick Start loans has been withdrawn and we are therefore unable to process any more Kick Start application.

Contact details

If you are interested in the schemes above, would like more information or would like us to arrange a visit by a 'You at Home' Home Improvement Agency Caseworker, please contact:-

You at Home

Phone:  0845 002 0097 or 01432 260710

Fax: 01432 260357

E-mail: yah@herefordshire.gov.uk

Call in to our office based at: 84 Whitecross Road, Hereford, HR4 0DH