If you live in a council home, but are not the official tenant or joint tenant (because your name isn't on the tenancy agreement) you can apply to take over the tenancy in certain circumstances.
In some situations you have the legal right to take over the tenancy: in other cases the council has the right to either agree or refuse your application - depending on your circumstances and whether there is a demand for the property. Please see the options below:
Someone who is still alive
If you wish to take over a tenancy of a person who is still alive you need to contact your local Housing Office and discuss the circumstances with a housing officer. All situations are dealt with on an individual basis.
Someone who has died
The law says that if a council tenant dies, the tenancy of their home can pass to their husband or wife, (or to the person who had been living with them as husband or wife). Or it can pass to a relative (parent, child, grandparent, grandchild, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, nephew or niece) if they had been living with the tenant for the previous twelve months. This is called a Succession.
Council policy extends these rights to someone who had been living with the tenant as part of a lesbian or gay couple.
If the tenancy passes to a relative, and the home is bigger than they need, we have the legal right to move them out to a suitable alternative home. But we would not move out a husband, wife, or partner in the same situation.
If someone has already taken over the tenancy following the death of a previous tenant, the tenancy does not have to go to someone else if they die. You only have one legal right to Succession.
Should you wish to discuss this further please contact your local Housing office.