Home » Making a Community Sponsorship application » Questions in section 3.6
Questions in section 3.6 of the application will ask you about accommodation for the resettled family, however, you do not need to secure accommodation to be approved in principle. Many Groups find applying for approval in principle makes the process faster, so that you can approach potential landlords knowing that every other thing you need to do has already been done.
If you are applying for approval in principle with no accommodation, you should tick ‘no’ at question 3.6a and move to section 4. It is worth familiarising yourself with the answers you will need to give in the future as this may help you to approach your housing search.
We strongly suggest that you do not sign tenancy agreements or secure property for a specific date until you have received full approval for your application from the Home Office. No-one wants to pay void property costs and it’s not the reason you have fundraised. The maximum available for void property costs is for an 8 week period at Local Housing Allowance rates for 1-3 bedroomed properties, and 12 weeks for a 4 bedroomed property.
Even if your Group is applying for approval in principle, once you find a home you will need to complete section 3.6 of the application form before you can be fully approved as a Community Sponsorship Group by the Home Office. This page will give an overview as well as some specifics of how to answer the questions in section 3.6. We’d recommend that you read our Housing and Empowerment resource to ensure that you adopt an empowerment approach to helping a resettled family take ownership for their own home.
If you are looking for a house, tell Reset and we’ll get the word out to landlords in your area. You can also add your Group to our housing matching spreadsheet.
It’s important to keep in mind that although now that you have the property and therefore a better idea of the size of family you’ll be welcoming, you still don’t know the exact family size or if they have any special needs that will allow them to claim more benefits so these calculations will need to be redone once you are allocated a family.
Although you are required to invite the Local Authority to view the property, if they agree that they do not need to see it or if you do not get a response, you can still tick YES and give details about the Local Authority’s involvement or lack of involvement regarding the property. You can submit a description of your correspondence with the Local Authority as evidence.
The evidence to support that the property meets the standards should be provided at 3.6m. You might need to attach a report to your application email but do confirm this here.
Our toolkit can help you plan what to include in your Welcome Pack and point you to other resources about planning for the family’s arrival.
If you do not feel a welcome pack is necessary, explain why here.
It’s possible that the family will want to move to another area, away from your Group and your support. Remember that part of an empowerment approach is supporting the family to make decisions, even if you do not agree with them. It’s your role to explain how moving to another area may affect the benefits they receive, and to help them to cultivate the skills to find a new home, a new GP surgery, enrol their children in new schools. However, it will be up to the resettled family to do these things themselves without the support of a Group such as yours.
Other points to consider in your answer:
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Find out how Community Sponsorship helps refugee families in need build a new life in the UK with confidence and dignity.
How do I sponsor a refugee family? How does the process work? Reset is here to support you every step of the way.
We’ve designed toolkits to make it easy for you if you’re involved as a lead sponsor or a local authority.
Wherever you are on the fulfilling and thrilling journey through Community Sponsorship, we have training courses, videos, articles and more, all designed to help your group and the family you support.
From drop-in sessions to UK-wide networking events, we bring together people and professionals involved in all stages of the Community Sponsorship journey.
Make a direct difference in the world by getting involved with your nearest Community Sponsorship group – or starting one up yourself!
Make an extraordinary difference to the lives of people who have lost everything by signing up to our (free) Landlords for Refugees register.
Not everyone can donate their time, so if you are choosing to donate money today instead or as well as, thank you. Your generosity is vital to the work we do support community-led welcome of refugees.
Help others by sharing your account. Why were you attracted to community-led welcome? What worked, what did you learn, what has the experience been like for you?
Reset empowers volunteers to welcome refugees into communities across the UK. Find out about us and the kinds of programmes we’ve been involved with.
Research, monitoring and evaluation are essential for making evidence-based decisions that will support Community Sponsorship to grow and flourish.
Sponsoring a refugee family is a significant responsibility. We advocate for Community Sponsors to ensure that they are properly supported throughout their journey.
Our advocacy focuses on representing the views of Community Sponsors to the Home Office to support them in implementing the necessary operational changes.
We also represent the views of Community Sponsors to other key stakeholders, including Local Authorities, international organisations, the wider resettlement field, housing providers and financial institutions. We also use our voice to campaign on policies affecting refugees. We are members of the Together With Refugees coalition, campaigning for a more humane approach to people seeking protection in the UK.