Housing Forum publishes 'Reaching for Recovery' report on future of housebuilding

The Housing Forum today called for a radical shake-up of house building and planning priorities to better accommodate current market conditions and better insulate for future market recovery.

Unveiling the findings of its ‘Reaching for Recovery’ report, The Forum highlighted the urgent need to review funding and planning models, re-evaluate land value and quality standards and ultimately reinstate a stronger sense of realism about the short and long term challenges facing the house building industry.

The report summarises the findings of four cross-industry working groups to investigate several key areas of housing industry reform including: Working Through Housing Market Changes, Land for Homes - Creating Real Value, Designing in Quality in Housing-led Mixed Use and Regeneration and Sustainable Housing Solutions in Major Regeneration and Refurbishment Schemes.

Each group produced a set of proposals which will be further developed in collaboration with The Housing Forum members and taken to Government. The Housing Forum entered into a new strategic relationship with the National House Building Council (NHBC) earlier this year and the two bodies will also be working together to take forward relevant recommendations.

Jeffrey Adams, Chairman of The Housing Forum and Group Chief Executive of United House Ltd, said: “The need to increase housing volumes and improve existing homes does not lessen in the wake of the financial crisis – rather the challenges and timescales for delivering reform simply become tighter and shorter.

"Without a radical shake up to how we value land, maximise existing stock and the steps we take to fund, plan and upskill for new development we may fall well short not only of our targets, but of the prospect of a sustainable market recovery.”

The key recommendations of the four working groups are:

1. Working Through Housing Market Changes

The group called for greater access to funding across the full spectrum of the housing market, rather than focusing on the prime market alone. Its recommendations included:

• Improve flexibility to allow more market-responsive, financially viable mixes of housing  on-site;
• Increase the amount of grant funding and work closer with the HCA to ‘unblock’ existing schemes;
• Re-assess the linkages between land values, Section 106, RSL development and affordability;
• Encourage more mortgage providers to offer share-ownership mortgages;
• Increase support and investment for the private rented sector – provide quality assurance through the adoption of The Housing Forum ‘Kitemark’

2. Land for Homes

The group focused on the need for sustained community leadership and a new realism about land value and the costs of sustainable development. Its recommendations included:

• Re-build planning skills within local government with counter-cyclical investment in training and increased knowledge-sharing;
• More systematic use of Sustainability Appraisals as a decision-making tool at every stage of development;
• Reduce over-reliance on land price and create a more empirical and consultatative approach to pricing spatial plans;
• Improve joint working between public and private sector investors and review long term asset management strategies;
• Instil a coordinated approach to infrastructure planning and invest in and integrate infrastructure from the outset;
• Adopt a culture of constant community engagement to reduce adversarial planning culture.

3. Designing in quality

The group highlighted the increased costs and risks of maintaining standards and ensuring mixed-use functionality in the current financial climate. Its recommendations included:

• Ensuring a clear, viable planning brief that allows for long term change in use;
• Increase access to appropriate training and shared learning to increase ‘mixed-use’ skills;
• Focus on building-in mutual cost efficiencies to ensure each element of the project ‘earns its keep’;
• Constant review of quality over the lifetime of the development.

4. Sustainable Refurbishment of the Existing Housing Stock

The group highlighted the need to invest, organise and tackle on a large scale the relatively low energy efficiency of existing homes and create a new approach to ongoing sustainable refurbishment. Its recommendations included:

• Increased investment in education for homeowners on energy use;
• More careful management of occupancy levels and the allocation of public housing stock to ensure a better balance of energy usage;
• Creation of a Code for Sustainable Homes – Refurbishment to set targets and guidelines for ongoing improvement;
• Increased incentives and rebates, including zero-rated VAT, for low energy developments.

Jeffrey Adams said: “The Housing Forum is uniquely placed to support the industry thanks to the access we have to the knowledge and insights of people from across the sector and our new strategic relationship with NHBC.

"The findings of the working groups provide a valuable contribution, not only to this year’s conference, but to the future direction of the industry.  We will now take this set of comprehensive recommendations to both Government and the industry and press for change where it is needed.”

The Housing Forum is a unique network of leaders and their supply chains from all sectors in housing development and construction.