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Section 211: Protection of property of homeless persons and persons threatened with homelessness.

Housing Act 1996 · 1996 c. 52View on legislation.gov.uk

Part VII: Homelessness: England

This section applies where a local housing authority have reason to believe that—

there is danger of loss of, or damage to, any personal property of an applicant by reason of his inability to protect it or deal with it, and
no other suitable arrangements have been or are being made.

  • section 188 (interim duty to accommodate),

  • section 189B (initial duty owed to all eligible persons who are homeless),

  • section 190, 193 or 195 (duties to persons found to be homeless or threatened with homelessness), or

  • section 200 (duties to applicant whose case is considered for referral or referred),

If they have not become subject to such a duty, they may take any steps they consider reasonable for that purpose.

The authority may decline to take action under this section except upon such conditions as they consider appropriate in the particular case, which may include conditions as to—

the making and recovery by the authority of reasonable charges for the action taken, or
the disposal by the authority, in such circumstances as may be specified, of property in relation to which they have taken action.

References in this section to personal property of the applicant include personal property of any person who might reasonably be expected to reside with him.

Section 212 contains provisions supplementing this section.

About this text

This legislation text comes from legislation.gov.uk. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. These source and reuse terms cover the legislation text, not Remedy's commentary.

Reuse reviewed 21 August 2026 under Open Government Licence v3.0.