[accymel]

They have to sometimes willow, say i get offered a new rented house even with HH, i look round today generally they like u to move to new one when your old ones notice is served, but in cases where repairs are needed they can drag on longer than expected

ie - notice on old house 30/6/07 ends & new tennancy starts but the repairs on new house is taking longer than that you can get weekly extentions to your notice on the old house till the new house is fit to move into - say it takes 2 weeks longer so means i got a 2 week extention on old house tennacy - this means there will be 2 weeks rent owing on new house as well as 2 weeks on old house - this is what they call an overlap which housing benefit will cover [they will cover upto 4 weeks sometimes more if exceptional circumstances ie refuge cos u have rent to pay in ref as u have rent in house u have had to temp or permanantly leave with few weeks + 4 weeks notice]

If this wasn't available then many could not simply move or take on new homes, thus many benefit people would accrue debt they cant afford, basically its set up so that houses can be let or re let in the rented sector - tho is open to abuse at times as landlords can get pushy as to taking up a tennacy asap - even before the 4 weeks notice required on previous properties & the new landlord gets rent quicker than waiting for the period to end.