CIH Presents – Mental health and housing: How to create sustainable tenancies for tenants who hoard

The online training course will allow you to explore hoarding through the lens of mental health, applying this new knowledge to how we support our tenants to create safe and sustainable tenancies for now and the future.

For years, hoarding has posed challenges to landlords resulting in high costs, unsustainable clearances, and loss of tenancies. Historically it was viewed more through the lens of anti-social behavioural and ‘lifestyle choice’. Housing providers had a duty of care to protect their tenants and have therefore been left to try and manage the complexities of hoarding in isolation.

However, in 2018, the World Health Organisation recognised hoarding as a classified mental health condition, resulting in new clinical, social, environmental and legislative considerations for individuals who hoard.

This course will contextualise hoarding as a mental health condition, exploring the classification history of hoarding, the psychology behind the behaviour, the impact on tenancies, and bringing new best practice to the forefront of how we understand, support and signpost those with hoarding tendencies.