Legal & General launches Build to Rent arm

Legal & General Capital (LGC) has launched a Suburban Build to Rent (SBTR) business, which will develop large scale ‘single family’ rental communities across the UK.

The housing arm will partner with UK housebuilders and undertake a direct delivery programme to bring forward in excess of 1,000 homes each year from 2024.

Nigel Wilson, chief executive of Legal & General, said: “As we prepare for economic recovery, businesses like ours must continue to invest in our future. In light of the pandemic, it is more important than ever that we deliver the houses that our society needs to address structural shortages across every dimension of the market. We are still falling far short of the over 300,000 new homes needed each year.

“To support this growing need, Legal & General has deployed institutional capital at scale to revolutionise affordable housing, later living, the urban rental market, build to sell and to speed up construction through modular housing. It’s now time that we play a significant role in the suburban single family rental housing market. Legal & General have the will, the capital and the deep sector knowledge to invest and drive real impact.”

Legal & General’s SBTR developments will offer a mixture of houses and low density apartments, whilst being designed to reflect new ways of living, post-COVID, such as incorporating home offices and more extensive outdoor space.

Alongside Legal & General’s other housing businesses, SBTR will target to be operationally carbon net zero by 2030.

In 2019 the operational UK BTR market was valued at around £10bn.

Legal & General said this market has untapped potential, while there is a societal need for high quality family homes to rent.

After launching a Build to Rent Fund in 2017, Legal & General has over 5,000 homes in operation or development across the UK’s major towns and cities.