Council offers up free land to landlord in new homes bid

Published by Ross Macmillan for 24dash.com in Housing and also in Communities, Local Government

A West Midlands council is offering up some of its land at no cost to a housing association in a bid to deliver affordable homes in the region.

Herefordshire Council is releasing some of its own land to allow for some 42 additional homes for local people across Ross, Leominster, Kingstone and Hereford.

WM Housing (locally managed by Kemble Housing) has been selected as the preferred housing partner to develop the affordable homes on the local authority land.

In return, the 23,500-home landlord will receive the land from Herefordshire Council at no cost to enable the properties to be affordable.

Councillor Brian Wilcox, Herefordshire Council’s cabinet member for the environment, housing and planning, said: “With this slow-down in house building generally by developers, we are using some of our own land for the development of affordable housing.

“We currently have around 5,000 people seeking affordable homes because the average house price in the county is £218,900 while the average salary is £25,280, which makes market-priced homes unaffordable for most residents."

Since April 2011, Herefordshire Council has delivered 52 new affordable homes, using a range of resources from central government, private finance and private developers.

The council is also piloting a new city centre living project, helping to bring unused space above shops back into use as residential accommodation.

The council is working with partners to secure funding through the Government’s Empty Homes Programme to support future delivery of such schemes.