Housing development

We work in partnership with Registered Providers (RPs), housing developers and the Greater London Authority (GLA) to develop new affordable homes. You can view a list of completed developments.

How we work

We support affordable housing development through our Housing Capital Programme. The Programme includes a pot of money set aside for improving affordable housing provision in the borough. This money is provided principally from Section 106 affordable housing financial contributions. The Programme also receives grant funding from the Greater London Authority (GLA). Most new affordable homes are supported with funding from the Mayor of London's Affordable Housing Programme.

Our Housing Capital Programme also works to provide grant funding to RPs to deliver affordable housing in the Borough and also to reduce overcrowding problems, by helping Registered Providers (RPs) to extend existing social housing. We work closely with RPs to identify opportunities to deliver affordable housing to meet the borough’s priority needs.

Key achievements

• In the last ten years to 2021/22, 844 new affordable homes have been provided in the borough. These homes have been delivered through a combination of new build or conversion schemes (such as those at the Teddington Studios site and Queens House Twickenham) and the purchase of properties on the open market, for use as affordable homes.
• 364 of these homes have been delivered with the support of more than £12m grant funding from our Housing Capital Programme.
• Of the completed homes, 89 affordable rented homes have been provided in partnership with Registered Providers through use of the Council’s assets such as the recently completed 19 homes scheme at Haydon Close (formerly the Avenue Centre) in Hampton Wick.
• 22 new affordable homes were completed in 2021/22 at Informer House, Teddington.

These figures are different to those prepared for statutory planning monitoring. You can read a full explanation of the difference in our Authority’s Monitoring Report (Section CP15 - Affordable housing)(pdf, 1366KB).

Shaping our vision

Our work is informed by a number of key strategies, which help us identify local housing need and provide affordable housing solutions. We aim to ensure that those living or working in the borough get initial priority when new shared ownership homes are sold.

These include:

• The Housing and Homelessness Strategy 2018-2023 (pdf, 2.2 MB) - provides a framework that identifies housing needs and highlights opportunities
• Local Plan - sets out adopted planning policies, which require us to provide affordable housing
• Affordable Housing Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) - explains how our planning policies will be implemented. Applicants, agents and developers are expected to use the SPD
• Tenancy Strategy 2019 (pdf, 255 KB) - explains our adopted approach to setting rent levels. RPs involved in providing new affordable housing should consider this information
• Intermediate Housing Policy Statement(pdf, 89KB) - explains how we prioritise applicants for intermediate housing including the income eligibility range. RPs involved in providing new affordable housing should consider this information
• Intermediate Housing Marketing Statement(pdf, 908KB) - outlines the requirements which RPs must meet when selling shared ownership homes in the borough

Contact

To find out more about affordable housing development, or to discuss upcoming affordable housing schemes contact Neil Cleary:

Telephone: 020 8891 7446
Email: neil.cleary@richmond.gov.uk