Lobbying group Generation Rent yesterday defiantly insisted its crowdfunding drive had raised enough money for it to survive, despite hitting barely a quarter of its target.

Its website had previously said that if the group’s £60,000 target was not met then staff would have been laid off, meaning the organisation could only possibly have existed with the help of volunteers.

However, despite less than £18,000 being raised in donations, Generation Rent said it would survive as a team of two – director Betsy Dillner and communications manager Dan Wilson Craw – until at least next spring, by which time it hopes to find additional funding.

The group has also been helped by a grant of £45,500 from the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust, which will be spent on the group’s work in London.

In its year-and-a-half of existence Generation Rent has succeeded in pushing the government to protect private renters from revenge evictions, take away landlords’ tax breaks and regulate letting agents.

It was forced to begin the crowdfunding operation after funding from backer the Nationwide Foundation was pulled following concerns the group had not done enough to secure its financial future.

The website said: “We have three things to do by next spring: push the government into protecting tenants from criminal landlords, win a commitment from the next Mayor of London to bring down rents in the city, and secure longer-term grant funding.

“We are already working on all three but this money is needed to keep the team in place and avoid losing any momentum.

“If we only hit our minimum we will have to lay off the team but the campaign can still exist as a volunteer-run organisation.”

In addition, a spokesman for the group told EYE in July that if it did not raise enough money by the August 31 deadline, “there is a real danger that the campaign will simply vanish, and with it the national voice of private renters in the media and political debate”.

However, yesterday the group said it had raised enough money to “keep campaigning for private renters across the UK”.

Dillner said: “A month ago our future looked very bleak, with no guarantee that we would be able to survive past September.

“The team here has thrown everything we had at fundraising and we have been humbled by the response. It is an incredible feeling to see the number of people and organisations with the confidence in us to donate to keep us in existence.

“We now have a big task to keep representing the growing private renter population and we will continue to rely on people power for our success.”