South: Clarke Willmott endorses call for more homes for rent following Brexit
In response to an independent report, published this week by the Centre for Economic and Business Research and commissioned by the National Housing Federation, which predicts that the UK economy could contract by £145 million in the next 10 years if the rate of growth in new housing completions falls at the same rate as it did in 2008, industry pundits, including Clarke Willmott LLP, have urged Gavin Barwell, the new housing minister, to support the building of more new homes to rent by relaxing the rules around public funding in the sector.
Spokesmen for the National Housing Federation and the Chartered Institute of Housing argue that building more homes for rent or shared-purchase would help keep housebuilding and the economy going in a time of economic austerity. CIH statistics show that during the last recession the number of homes built by non-profit housing associations increased by 22 per cent between 2007 and 2009, while private development dropped off 37 per cent. Up to 300,000 units could be built by housing associations by 2020, according to the NHF, if funding were made available - even in the face of economic uncertainty.
Reallocation of the central budget to allow housing associations to build more rental homes would also mitigate the negative effects of a general slowdown in the housebuilding sector, widely anticipated as a result of Brexit, according to James Howard, partner in Clarke Willmott LLP’s social housing development team.
Howard said: “A change in funding strategy to switch the balance to building more for rent than for sale should allow for a supply of new homes to continue despite the gap private sector housebuilders might leave behind.”
Jonathan Hulley, Clarke Willmott’s head of housing and asset management, said that the Government’s flagship starter-homes scheme could lead to the undermining of sales of more affordable shared-ownership properties, and it fails to address the urgent need for more affordable homes to rent.
He added: “The kind of shared ownership offered by housing associations would put homes within the reach of the many people who would otherwise be unable to afford them. It’s high time for a change in government policy to support greater flexibility to deliver not just on homes for sale, but also allowing more to be built to rent.”
