Deep cuts to the national social housing budget will prolong the North West’s unwanted status as the region with the highest number of empty homes in England, according to accountants and business advisors Beever and Struthers.
Housing organisations fear that budget cuts planned from 2011will stall and possibly even reverse Government initiatives to occupy vacant properties in England – recent estimates of the number of empty homes range from 652,000 to as many as 784,000.
Under the KickStart initiative, The Homes and Communities Agency, the national housing and regeneration agency for England, has announced £83m to unlock 5,696 new homes nationwide, including 3,503 affordable homes – some £10.5m of this latest tranche of funding is for 805 homes in the North West.
But statistics for 2009 from independent charity the Empty Homes Agency (EHA) show almost 123,000 empty properties in the North West of England – representing 3.91 per cent of the region’s total housing stock.
In the North West, 3,714 of the empty homes are owned by councils, more than 64,300 are private homes vacant for more than six months and 4,721 are private homes vacant for more than six months for regeneration or housing schemes.
The figures for the North West contrast with those from the EHA for other regions in England such as 90,768 empty homes in Yorkshire and Humber (3.95 per cent of stock) and 69,002 homes (2.94 per cent of stock) in the West Midlands. There are almost 652,000 empty homes in England as a whole, according to the Empty Homes Agency.
Housing groups fear that expected cuts to the housing budget from 2011 will prevent empty homes being returned to use to contribute to a cut in the ever-lengthening housing waiting list – the latest total of those on the list stands at an all time high of more than 1.8 million.
Government spending on all housing hit £8.9bn in 2008/09 – its highest level for 15 years – and some 207,000 homes were built. But that figure was below the Government’s stated ambition of building 240,000 homes a year by 2016 and predicted cuts in funding will further reduce the number being constructed.
Empty properties blight both the private and public sectors – many buy-to-let apartments in major cities such as Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Birmingham stand empty because private developers misjudged the level of demand while not building sufficient numbers of family homes and housing associations and local authorities hold empty stock including properties vacated by residents for major regeneration schemes.
Housing associations are suffering because of the decline in the wider housing market in the longest and deepest recession since the 1930s – associations traditionally subsidised rented housing activities with profits from selling properties to people wanting to buy their home. But those profits have dwindled because homes have not been selling in the downturn and the funds are consequently not available for improvements to the social rental sector.
Chris Porritt, senior partner and head of the not-for-profit team at Beever and Struthers, said: “We obviously welcome the record level of investment in housing but predicted budget cuts from 2011 will saddle the North West with the stigma of having more empty homes than any other region in England.
“There’s an element of uncertainty caused by the looming General Election but whichever party is elected must make a renewed long-term commitment to maintain current spending levels to get people off the waiting list and into a place they can call home.
“We need radical thinking and relaxed regulation to make the best possible use of funding for empty properties.”
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For further information please contact – Justin Strong, associate director, SKV Communications on 0161 838 7770 or e-mail justin.strong@skvcommunications.co.uk
Notes to editors:
Beever and Struthers is a UK Top 50 accountancy and business advisory firm with offices in Manchester, Blackburn and London and the largest independent practice in Greater Manchester. The firm recently merged with Waterworths, an accountancy firm in Blackburn.
The enlarged firm has 26 partners and more than 150 staff providing a full service offering in areas including accountancy, audit, tax, corporate finance, fraud, grants consultancy, financial services and business assurance.
It specialises in sectors such as social housing (is currently a Top 4 provider of audit and assurance services in the UK to housing associations), charity, not for profit and sport.
