24 January 2012
Housing Minister Grant Shapps recently asked charities and
businesses to come forward with ideas on how the proposed £150m
Empty Homes Fund could be used innovatively to bring empty homes
back into use. Tony Hutchinson looks at some of the
ideas...
Empty homes cause blight in neighbourhoods
across the country. Decaying properties with broken windows,
leaking roofs and choked gutters invite nuisance, trespass and
crime. Living next to an empty home is unsightly, costly as it
reduces the value of adjacent homes, and dangerous as empty homes
are targeted for fires, theft of pipes (leading to gas escapes) and
theft of copper wire (with the risk of electrical arcs).
The problem is not new and there have been
many initiatives to bring homes back into use through persuasion or
compulsion. So how can the proposed Empty Homes Fund (EHF)
stimulate action?
...Empty homes tend to occur in clusters, in neighbourhoods where there are specific issues of condition, demand or lack of economic activity. Effecting lasting change must require action on the condition of the stock, stabilising the social structure and stimulating economic activity...
At one level the money could used to acquire
empty homes, renovate them and sell them for owner occupation. The
problem here is the fact that a home is empty and in disrepair
suggests that the cost of bringing back into use may be more than
the value of the completed property. The fund would be certainly
depleted quickly with only a proportion of the estimated 734,000
empty properties tackled.
Empty homes tend to occur in clusters, in
neighbourhoods where there are specific issues of condition, demand
or lack of economic activity. Effecting lasting change must require
action on the condition of the stock, stabilising the social
structure and stimulating economic activity.
Therefore, for there to be a significant
impact on the number of empty homes the funding from government has
to lever further investment and be recycled. Councils have a number
of powers under which they can either acquire properties which are
problematic or require them to be sold. For example, the New Homes
Bonus provides councils with an incentive to bring empty property
back into use, but as this follows the action being taken and the
procedures are costly, lengthy and uncertain it does not help
initiate action. .
Nevertheless, these are just a few of the
ideas which could work:
- Councils who have an Empty Homes
Strategy approved by their members and endorse by their Local
Strategic Partnership can request an allocation from the EHF to
pump prime delivery of their strategy to identify and acquire empty
houses, funding the officer and legal costs necessary to acquire
and sell the properties;
- Properties are sold with a
requirement to renovate and bring back into occupation within a
defined period with the opportunity to access a low interest loan
using the EHF as security to cover the costs of renovation, subject
to repayment after five years or when the property is sold
whichever is the sooner. Sales would be either for home ownership
and occupation or to a landlord agreeing to manage in line with the
standards required of RSLs;
- Projects would also be eligible
for Green New Deal support to improve thermal efficiency, reduce
water flowing into the drains and sewers;
- New Homes Bonus to be used to
rework street and refuse management reducing the proliferation of
bins;
- Loan repayments and receipts
would be recycled back to the core fund, costs recovered from the
sales of property would be used to fund further activity and any
surpluses generated returned to the EHF.
Tony
Hutchinson(thutchinson@capita.co.uk)
is Associate Director, Regeneration and Development Management, at
Capita Symonds