Opinion: Open Data Challenge - Making life easier for tenants » Housing » 24dash.com

"The Housing Open Data Challenge is a competition that asked teams and individuals to come up with new ways of using open data – that which is publicly available – to help make life better for renters. After an initial application stage and intense weekend of coaching, social impact analysis and data-delving, we have now shortlisted three finalists to tackle tenant issues. They were chosen by a panel of industry professionals, including the head of research at Shelter Shannon Harvey and HACT chief executive Matt Leach. Thanks to Nesta and the Open Data Institute, each have been awarded £5,000 to help hone their product and take them forward to the final in December, when a winning team will take home £40,000 to help bring their innovation to market ... Open Jam Jar ... This project is a simple compilation of all the credit unions and financial institutions willing to provide so-called jam jar accounts, where a tenant’s housing benefit is received, the rent is paid and the rest of the money is left available for the tenant. The idea is to limit the chances of a tenant defaulting on their rent and to signpost them to support if they do so, hopefully giving them alternative routes other than high-cost borrowing ... Housing Tinder (working title) ... We want to help social tenants get the best out of renting with an app that encourages more swaps. Social housing tenants currently find it hard to move; waiting times for a transfer are high leaving people overcrowded or under-occupying. Taking inspiration from dating apps, an easy to use matching and messaging function will put tenants interested in swapping their home in touch with each other. Open data about the area such as schools, GPs and jobs will help users make the best decisions about where to live. Our ultimate goal is to develop an app which helps social tenants take control, search for homes and make contact, taking the first steps to moving ... Fair Rent ... Have you ever wondered how much your landlord is raking in? Fair Rent aims to make a standard landlord cost formula from publicly available information to show profits landlords are making and plot this on a scale to compare market rates, social rents and your landlord’s rent. This project aims to empower tenants while giving landlords a tool to understand what a fair rent is and offers a service platform to connect them and incentivise the practice of fairer rents ..."