How we started: We are new.  We set up as a charity in July 2015 mainly to help people moving on from supported accommodation.

Most people move from supported housing into a Council or Housing Association flat. The high demand for this type of housing though, means that people are waiting much longer for somewhere to live.   Also, the limited choices available often leads to them accepting a flat on a large council estate for example, where lack of a sense of community can lead to social isolation that can impact on their mental wellbeing.

There are even fewer options in the private sector – more often than not, landlords won’t accept people who are not employed and/or who have no credit history, a situation which applies to many people who we support.  There is also high demand and a limited supply of property in the private rented sector so rents tend to be unaffordable and landlords more selective.

We aim to develop our services so that less well-off individuals who need a helping hand can be offered an alternative.

A bit about what we do:  Generally, we aim to help people find somewhere to live and to support them to keep their home once they have found it.  Unfortunately, we are not able to help everyone – just those who struggle to find and keep a home without help.

We hope to achieve this through working in partnership with local authorities, other social housing landlords and private property owners to source a whole range of accommodation that we can offer to our service users.

We attract property owners through leasing accommodation with the offer of guaranteed rental income for the term of the lease, full management of the accommodation throughout the lease term and return of the accommodation in the same state as at the start of the lease.

We also hope to achieve our aims through our “Ready, Steady Rent” initiative  – a fun and interactive course on how to manage a home of your own with confidence.

The Stone Foundation has a Constitution and is accountable to its board of Trustees. It has a very small staff team to manage the organisation and the Ready Steady Rent service, commissioning and and purchasing other services such as admin and accountancy support from Mavam. Currently, we also commission Mavam Support and YLOH to provide support to our tenants but we are more than willing to work with other support providers once we have sufficient capacity in our property portfolio.

We welcome enquiries from property owners across Suffolk and support providers looking for accommodation.