Wales's housing charity#
Shelter Cymru is the working name of Welsh Housing Aid Ltd, a charity that says it exists to defend the right to a safe home in Wales. It is a separate organisation from Shelter, which covers England and Scotland. It gives free, confidential and independent advice online, face to face and by phone, and its solicitors can help fight repossession and eviction and go to court. It also trains housing professionals and campaigns on renting and homelessness. By its own count it helped 20,820 people in housing need last year, including 6,086 dependent children.
Its whole website is also in Welsh, at sheltercymru.org.uk/cy.
How to get advice#
The get help page brings the routes together:
- Urgent helpline. Weekdays from 9am to 4pm, for people with nowhere to sleep, at risk of harm, facing eviction or in court proceedings. It warns of high call volumes, and asks you to have documents such as tenancy agreements, court papers and council letters to hand.
- Webchat. Weekdays from 9am to 4pm, for new clients, in English only; a chat usually takes about 20 minutes.
- Email advice, through a form on the site.
- Local advice. Advice near you lets you pick your county, across all of Wales.
Its advice covers the law in Wales only. Young people aged 16 to 24 also have its pages for under 25s and a youth homelessness helpline run by Llamau, which it lists for nights and weekends.
No fixed address, GP and benefits#
Shelter Cymru publishes nothing about deed polls or changing your name. Two lines from its homelessness advice matter if you are changing your name without a settled home: you can register with a GP even without a permanent address, and you can still claim benefits without one. Its LGBTQ+ page notes that people are most at risk of homelessness around the time they tell their family about their sexuality or gender identity, and that the Equality Act 2010 protects against housing discrimination on those grounds.
Housing records in Wales after a new name#
Wales and England share one law on names, so a deed poll made in Cardiff works exactly as one made in Carlisle (changing your name in Wales). GOV.UK publishes the free wording, and its deed poll guidance is also available in Welsh.
Housing law is where Wales differs. Most renters in Wales now hold an occupation contract rather than a tenancy, but the practical step is the same: write to your landlord with a copy of the deed and ask for your name to be updated on the contract and the deposit record. Changing the name on your tenancy agreement explains the step, though some of its details are written for England. Tell the council too, for council tax and any housing application, and bring both names to a Shelter Cymru appointment so the adviser can match your papers.
Who it is not for#
Shelter Cymru advises only on housing in Wales. In England, use Shelter; in Northern Ireland, Housing Rights. Its webchat will not advise landlords or anyone trying to make another person homeless.
This page describes what Shelter Cymru publishes on its own website, read on 26 October 2026. Shelter Cymru has not reviewed it, and listing a charity here does not mean it recommends this handbook or any deed poll service.
