Team Lopez – Julia has welcomed the £3.4 billion investment to deliver 29,456 new affordable homes across London through the Conservative Government’s Affordable Homes Programme.
The total £8.6 billion investment across England will help to build 119,000 new affordable homes, including 57,000 for ownership, 29,600 for social rent and 6,250 affordable rural homes.
The new affordable homes available for ownership will help more young people and families to get a foot on the housing ladder, building on other schemes from the Conservative Government to help first-time buyers into homeownership, including First Homes – offering new homes at a 30% discount on the open market value – and the 95% mortgage guarantee scheme – which helps first-time buyers secure a mortgage with just a 5% deposit.
The nearly 30,000 homes for Social Rent – which are typically 50% to 60% of market prices – will provide secure, affordable housing to people who need it most. It will also deliver new supported housing for some of the most vulnerable, providing much needed homes for older or disabled people with support needs.
This investment is expected to support up to 370,000 construction jobs across the country for the home building industry including SME developers, major housebuilders and infrastructure specialists as well as the wider local economies – expecting to generate up to £26 billion of wider private and public investment.
Since 2010, the Conservative Government has delivered over 542,400 new affordable homes – and this investment marks an important step towards meeting its promise to deliver 300,000 new homes a year by the mid-2020s.