Elderly people are being asked to help solve the housing crisis by making their homes available for families.

In return, Brighton and Hove Council will offer them a smaller home in a sheltered scheme or a flat provided by a housing association.

The council says many elderly people who own their homes find them hard to look after and are keen to sell, provided they can find something suitable for their needs.

In the new scheme, which was approved at a council housing meeting, housing associations would buy homes from elderly people who would then be allocated council or association homes.

They will receive cash for their sales and be looked after by either the council or associations with reputations as good landlords and who charge rents that are generally much cheaper than those in the private sector.

The council and housing associations are having problems in meeting the need for big family homes because there are few new sites for development.

Council housing cabinet councillor Tehmtan Framroze said: "This new scheme will increase the supply of affordable larger family homes available to the council to allocate to families who desperately need houses of three bedrooms or more.

"It will also help senior citizen home-owners whose circumstances have changed since they bought their family home and who are looking to the council for help because they are finding the size of their own homes increasingly difficult to manage."

He said housing associations were keen to get on with the initiative now it had been approved.

He said: "There is a severe shortage of space for large new family homes in Brighton and Hove."

Anyone interested in the initiative should write to the council's head of housing, Gary Thurston, at Bartholomew House in Bartholomew Square, Brighton.