Plymouth City Council and Plymouth Community Homes (PCH) have secured funding from Homes England to start work on 80 new social rent homes in Plymouth city centre.
The Bath Street project will be built on the temporary car park off Martin Street, as part of the wider Millbay regeneration.
The plan is for up to 135 affordable homes in total, including social rent and shared ownership.
The first phase will deliver 80 homes and one commercial unit, with a mix of one and two bed flats and three bed houses, aimed at people on the Devon Home Choice waiting list.
The £33.5m scheme got full planning permission at the end of 2023.
Funding includes over £5m from Plymouth City Council’s Plan for Homes, a £14.2m contribution from Plymouth Community Homes (PCH), and grant support from Homes England. Classic Builders will start on site in February or March 2026.
Work is expected to take place in three phases, with the first 80 homes due to be finished by early 2029.
Andrew Lawrie, head of development at PCH, said: “Substantial grant funding was essential to enable this major affordable housing scheme to happen at Bath Street and this is a tremendous outcome, enabling us to make a start to the regeneration of this area of Plymouth city centre so we can deliver a large number of much-needed new homes for those on the waiting list for a social rent home.
“We are really grateful to our partners Plymouth City Council for their support in helping us secure the necessary Government funding, and to Homes England for their unprecedented level of grant support which has unlocked our ability to bring forward this development and get started.”
Councillor Chris Penberthy, Cabinet Member for Housing, Communities and Cooperative Development, said: “I am so pleased to secure the funding from Homes England for what we believe will be a truly catalytic project for the transformation of the city centre and the delivery of 10,000 new homes.
“This, for me, is what the Plan for Homes is all about – bringing partners together and accessing funding to unlock sites like this that the market would not ordinarily consider viable.
“Because of this our extensive partnership working over a long period of time, we can now move forward to deliver a mix and range of well-designed and sustainable affordable homes which are needed to ease the pressures of the housing crisis.”
Shahi Islam, director of affordable housing grants at Homes England, said: “As the Government’s housing and regeneration agency, increasing the supply of quality affordable homes remains one of our key objectives and we are committed to supporting Plymouth Community Homes to achieve their ambitions.
“The eco-friendly development at Bath Street is a prime example of how we are working collaboratively with partners to achieve our mission to build thriving communities that people can be proud to call home.”
