The Government’s new Shared Ownership and Affordable Homes Programme 2021-26 was launched on 1st April 2021. This new programme has shifted its focus from previous years, with the emphasis now on funding a number of ‘Strategic Partnerships’ to deliver the bulk of the programme, rather than taking continuous bids for individual sites during the 5-year period. Organisations forming these partnerships will be a mix of housing associations, local authorities, private housebuilders and for-profit registered providers.
Homes England will be making available £7.4bn in England, to deliver up to 130,000 starts on site, of affordable homes, by March 2026. With a further £4bn for London itself, providing a further 50,000 starts on site.
A date for the announcement of successful bids in England, has not yet been provided, but London allocations will be announced in June 2021.
Strategic Partnerships
Strategic partnerships will apply to be part of the programme through four funding streams: Not-for-profit, Long Term, For-profit and Local Authority. An important point to note, is that all of the strategic partnerships, regardless of funding stream, must commit to delivering 25% of the homes they develop through Modern Methods of Construction.
Stream One – Not-for-profit
This is similar to the current strategic partnerships, where single Housing Associations or partnerships will be able to bid for a grant package up to £250m, to deliver at least 1,500 homes in the next five years.
Stream Two – Long Term
This applies to the 23 partners that are currently part of strategic partnerships, who had already signed up for the previous programme, in 2018. These partnerships must commit to 4,000 homes in the five-year period. These homes must all be started by 31 March 2027 and completed by 31 March 2029. All of the grant allocations must be claimed by 31 March 2026.
Stream Three – For-profit
This will be open to for-profit registered providers and private developers, that will be building homes for affordable tenures, to be managed by associations, once complete. These applicants will have to build at least 1,500 homes. Homes England will not allow these organisations to form partnerships alongside other companies.
Stream Four – Local Authority
Local Authorities or Local Authority partnerships will now be able to bid for grant of up to £150m. Again, Local Authorities will have to commit to building 1,500 homes, with all needing to start on site by 31 March 2026.
Continuous Market Engagement
Continuous market engagement (CME) bids are still allowed as part of this programme, but they are not the main focus of delivery, strategic partnerships are. Therefore, the SOAHP programme can be used, to some extent, to provide access to grant for individual schemes, but bids will only be accepted while overall funding remains unallocated. The amount of ongoing CME bids, will therefore depend on the take up of the available grant by Strategic Partnerships. All schemes funded through CME must have started on site by 30 September 2025 and be completed by 31 March 2026.
Privately-financed Homes
Additionally, thousands of new homes are now provided in the social housing sector through private finance, with some degree of commercial risk being accepted by the landlord. Housing associations still deliver the largest number of these newbuild homes, with a number of them now acting as developers in their own right, having set up their own development companies.
You can target social housing newbuild on PREEMPT by reviewing:
- Our priority lists of top developing housing associations and local authorities (for both public and private programmes)
- Development posts e.g. Development Director / Development Manager for those organisations who build new homes
- Information on those landlords with their own (separately named) development companies including their contact details
- Information on the 23 partners that are part of existing Strategic Partnerships, which are the key parties currently delivering newbuild, publicly funded homes
- Current winners (mostly building contractors and developers) of newbuild contracts and frameworks, tendered through OJEU and the new Find a Tender Service (FTS); and the procurement consortia or landlords these contracts are with
- Information, as it unfolds, on the new Strategic Partnerships chosen by the Government, as part of this latest 5-year newbuild development programme for England and London
- Current and archived weekly bulletin articles, by topic and individual landlords, providing background over the last 12 months
- Our comprehensive research on over 50 modular manufacturers, including system types, what components are being factory fitted and contact details
- Information on long term Government initiatives, such as Garden Towns, Garden Villages and Garden Cities, and their locations
We hope you have found this information useful and you’d like to learn more about PREEMPT and how Focal Research can help your business, please feel free to get in touch and we’d be happy to arrange a virtual meeting.
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