Acquisitions Officer

About us at Hounslow

We’d love you to join us at the London Borough of Hounslow! Our people are deeply committed to providing excellent services to our residents, doing all we can to make lives as good as they can be.

We are an outstanding council, serving an outstanding borough. With brilliant, visionary leadership, a dynamic Cabinet and a can-do culture, we’ve built strong partnerships which have transformed how we serve one of London’s most diverse boroughs. Hounslow is the world in one place and full of potential. We are stepping up for our residents like never before.

About our Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion

We live by five core values: Lead with Heart, Do New, Pass on the Power, Harness the Mix and Be a Rock. All our work has equality, diversity and inclusion at its very heart, best articulated in “Harness the Mix”. It's about breaking down barriers between our parts and people and unlocking the problem-solving power of our amazing mix of minds. We serve a diverse community, we have a diverse workforce and we are committed to being an inclusive employer.

We work hard to create representation across our workforce and leadership community, we have thriving employee network groups and our learning and development programmes help us lead, model and breathe ways of working that eliminate inequality, inequity, injustice and bias.

As part of this and under our commitments as a Disability Confident Employer, we make reasonable adjustments to accommodate our candidates. There’s space for you to tell us what you need within our application form.

About The Role

This is an exciting opportunity to join Homelessness, Independence and Preventative Services, Property Procurement Accommodation Service, which adopts a preventative approach across the housing, health and social care agendas. Your primary focus will be to work with private landlords and agents to acquire new properties that are suitable to prevent or resolve homelessness.

You must be professional, energetic and enthusiastic as we are interested in what you can bring to help us improve and develop our services to support landlords and agents letting out their properties to some of our most vulnerable residents. You must be able to learn and develop your knowledge required for this role and be able to travel independently around the Borough. 

About The Team You’ll Be Working In

This is an exciting and busy role that is at the centre of the Councils response to homelessness. The service is developing and progressing our agenda to reduce the use of temporary accommodation and achieve more upstream prevention outcomes.

1.     This role is to increase the supply of private rented and temporary accommodation for residents who are homeless or threatened with homelessness, under various different property procurement schemes being operated in the Hounslow borough.

2.     You will carry out property inspections to ensure that landlords and property agents meet the required decant homes standards and sign-up tenancies across different tenures.

3.     You will be provide a vetting and letting process to private landlords, arranging viewings and support homeless households in accepting accommodation in the private sector in discharge of the council’s housing duties.

4.     You will ensure that accommodation complies with relevant standards and legislation and that supporting documentation is obtained and recorded.

5.     You will ensure private rented tenancies are affordable for prospective tenants and suitable for their needs.

About You

1.     You have experience of successfully increasing the supply of accommodation for residents who are homeless or threatened with homelessness.

2.     You are a great communicator to engage effectively with a broad range of people to influence, motivate, negotiate and persuade and you quickly build trusting relationships with complex individuals, and other professionals, to empower residents to build resilience and gain and maintain their independence.

3.     You are able to devise solutions to complex and contentious problems.

4.     You are a high performing individual who works collaboratively with others, adapting to meet a range of changing needs while achieving targets and service objectives and make the team the very best it can be.

5.     You have exceptional negotiation skills.

6.     You preferably have a current driving licence but can travel independently around the Borough to carry out home visits and meet residents and other professionals in community settings.

If the points below resonate with you, we’d love you to put in an application:

•      Are you passionate about customer services?

•      Are you an experienced homelessness professional?

•      Are you looking to working in a forward thinking and progressive housing department?

Qualifications:

HHSRS Trained Desirable

Essential for The Role:

Basic DBS 

To read more about what we are doing and what a great time it is to join us, and be part of a bold plan to provide good quality homes, please see  https://hounslowhousingjobs.pennacloud.com

Closing date: 10 March 2025.