[The councils are the worst offenders for leaving houses empty! What about someone working abroad for 10 months and comes home to a house full of asylum seekers!-ed]

Homes left empty for six months can be seized by councils and rented out as social housing under legislation coming into force next month.

An Empty Dwelling Management Order will allow local housing authorities to take control of privately-owned homes if they have been unoccupied and are not likely to be occupied in the “near future”.

The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG), said housing authorities will “effectively ’step into the shoes’ of the owner of an unoccupied dwelling”. Owners will be paid only the surplus revenue left after the authority’s running costs have been covered.

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