First Affordable Homes Programme contracts signed with the HCA

HCA area teams and the National Programmes team have been working hard during the summer months to finalise negotiations under the Agency’s £2.2bn Affordable Homes Programme and bring partners to the contract signing stage. 

The first five contracts to be signed were announced earlier this month – with Orwell HA, Town and Country HA, Westfield, Worthing Homes and Waterloo Housing Group – and it is anticipated that the vast majority of all 146 contracts will be signed by the end of October.

The first five contracts total £75.3m and will deliver nearly 4,000 new homes; 3085 for Affordable Rent and 731 for Affordable Home Ownership, helping first time buyers to get a foot on the property ladder.  Key local priorities are also being met with nearly 500 homes for rural areas, which have particularly acute problems with affordability; and over 1,000 larger family sized homes of 3-bedrooms or more.

Fiona MacGregor, head of affordable housing at the HCA, commented:

“Signing of the first contracts is a significant milestone and we anticipate the number of signings to increase exponentially over the coming weeks.  The process has been well received by our partners who must take considerable credit for the way in which they have risen to the challenge of delivering this Programme, with good value for public money and a wide geographic spread of quality new homes.

“In total the AHP will deliver 80,000 new affordable homes – considerably more than originally anticipated – and meets locally identified needs and priorities.”

Also during the Summer months, the HCA published guidance confirming that Housing Associations and Councils that did not receive any grant allocation under the AHP would still be able to build new homes for Affordable Rent, under a Short Form Agreement with the HCA.