George Obsbourne will be announcing his spending plans for the UK during his annual Budget report on March the 20th, and due to the fact that even the smallest decision could impact millions of families there are already rumours flying about concerning what he plans to invest in. The housebuilding industry is therefore excited to hear the rumour that the government is planning on investing two hundred million pounds into the industry in order to provide more private rented accommodation and ease the current housing crisis.
However, since 2010 the government has cut funding for housing associations, meaning that many are starting to no longer rely on government investments and have instead chosen to venture into the commercial sector themselves, whilst looking for new ways to secure funding in order to build more properties in the future. Thames Valley Housing has already set up a commercial arm called Fizzy Living which has already gained a seventy million pound investment and are hoping to attract even more investors throughout the upcoming year.
Discussing the company, development director at Thames Valley Housing, Mark Allnut said: “It’s all up for the taking. There needs to be a private sector solution – if there’s too much long-term government support it becomes like a crutch, and people start relying on it.” Meanwhile, chief executive of Fizzy Living, Harry Downes, said: “The private rental sector has huge demand and it’ll be a long time before that demand is used up. We’re hoping those institutions will see that they can now invest in the UK market. Anyone would agree that it is an attractive asset. What we need to do is start putting specialist properties into the market. Nobody’s building this at the moment.”
Fizzy Living are so confident that they will be able to find investors to fund their housebuilding projects that they have officially said that even if the government does provide two hundred million pounds for the housebuilding industry they will not put in a bid for it. They believe that there is “a lot of activity” in the private rented sector and are already planning on investing forty million pounds on one hundred homes across the area.
Landlords who offer private rented accommodations will be happy to hear that there are now more companies willing to invest in the sector themselves instead of relying on government handouts, as it will mean more business for them as well as their sister industries such as landlord insurance providers.