Housing programmes delivered by Homes England resulted in 36,478 new houses starting on-site and 32,990 houses being completed between 1 April 2022 and 31 March 2023, new data revealed.
According to the government data, the Shared Ownership and Affordable Homes Programme is on course to exceed its objective of delivering 130,000 new affordable homes, with 126,800 starts by the end of March 2023 and a further 5,000 remaining starts to deliver in 2023-24.
Due to the impact on the affordable housing sector caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, Government agreed an extension to the 2016-21 programme until March 2023, giving the sector funding stability and ensuring affordable housing providers could continue to build their pipeline and deliver through the current programme.
A subsequent extension was agreed in 2022 to safeguard the sector against turbulent market conditions.
From 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2023, over three-quarters of starts (28,457) were for affordable homes.
This marks an increase of 3% on the previous year, due to the maturing of the Affordable Homes Programme 2021-26 in its second year of delivery.
Of the housing completions, 23,318 were for affordable homes, which is a 12% decrease on the previous year.
This decrease can be attributed to the closure of the Affordable Homes Guarantees, Care and Support Specialised Housing, Empty Homes and Shared Ownership Affordable Homes Programme 2016-21, with completions naturally reducing towards the end of a programme life cycle.
Peter Denton, chief executive of Homes England, said: “The success of the Shared Ownership and Affordable Housing Programme 2016-21 is testament to the drive, ambition and resilience of our delivery partners to build their pipelines in the face of unprecedented barriers, and create over 130,000 new, quality affordable homes for families across the country.
“It is also encouraging to see an increase in the number of affordable homes starting on site in 2022-23, thanks in no small part to partners maintaining momentum through early site identification and strong delivery pipelines.”
He added: “However, the wider statistics released today reflect the delivery challenges faced by the housebuilding sector over the past year.
“Affordable housing providers experienced a perfect storm of build cost inflation, rising labour costs, material availability, building remediation issues and the duty to support tenants through a cost-of-living crisis, all of which hindered investment in new homes, leading to stalled or stopped schemes.
“The change has been agreed with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and HM Treasury, and is part of the Agency’s wider efforts to help bolster the affordable housing sector and maintain housing supply.”
