If you want to move house, there are a number of options available, whether you want to continue to rent or would like to get into home ownership.
If you find you need to move home for any reason, we can you offer help and advice to find the best option for you.
If you would like to move to another Horizon property you need apply through Find a Home.
You may be entitled to a transfer priority pass, dependant on your reasons for moving. This may mean that you are given more priority than other people bidding who are not Horizon tenants. It may also give you priority for properties of other landlords in the Link group (Link, Larkfield and West Highland Housing Associations).
To check if you are eligible for a pass you will find the criteria on the Find a Home website or you can speak to your Housing Officer.
Your Housing Officer can also help you to find other social landlords in the areas you are interested in and can help with application forms if required. You should also be able to get information on applying for social housing (and also about private letting) on the housing options pages of councils’ websites.
You may also want to consider a mutual exchange - this is sometimes a quicker option than a transfer or applying to another landlord.
You can apply to exchange properties or ‘swap’ with another tenant.
The person who you exchange with doesn’t need to be a Horizon tenant – they can be a tenant or any housing association or Council anywhere in the UK (you cannot exchange with a tenant of a private landlord).
You can search for homes and advertise your property on Homeswapper - a national register of people looking to exchange properties.
This service is free and will allow you to add your property and search for properties meeting your needs, not just in your local area but nationwide.
Once you have found someone to exchange with you need to complete a Mutual Exchange Form - you can download it or contact us and we can send it to you.
Both you and the person you want to exchange with have to complete this form.
If the person you want to exchange with is not a Horizon tenant they have to complete a different version of the form.
Once the forms are returned we will give you a decision within 28 days from when we get them.
Please note – you cannot exchange your tenancy unless you receive written permission from us AND the other tenant’s landlord.
There are a number of reasons why we may refuse permission for tenants to exchange properties, these could include if you:
It is important to understand if you exchange properties you will be accepting the property ‘as is’ and you will be responsible for any damage to the property caused by the other tenant or outstanding repairs that they have not completed prior to moving out.
This is a type of home ownership where you buy part of a property (minimum of 25% and a maximum of 75%) and pay rent (called an occupancy charge) to Horizon to cover the remaining share. Horizon has around 25 of these properties.
We look after a scheme called Access Ownership, which helps disabled people to purchase a home that meets their needs under a similar arrangement to Shared Ownership.
The main difference is that the share can be any percentage rather than the set percentages under Shared Ownership.
Horizon purchases and manages any new properties that are bought as part of this scheme.
Link manages a number of shared equity schemes on behalf of the Scottish Government to help people on low to moderate incomes to buy their own home.
For more information on these schemes visit Link's website.