New government funding schemes will no longer be able to use the money for unjustified new leasehold houses, it has been announced, as part of a move to tackle unfair and abuse within the leasehold system.
Housing Secretary of State James Brokenshire also announced the release of £450 million to speed up delivery of homes on sites of surplus public sector land. The Government will also speed up and encouraging modern methods of construction.
And he confirmed that through Homes England almost 1,000 new affordable homes will be built on a previously undeveloped site at Burgess Hill, Sussex demonstrating how a more strategic and assertive approach to getting homes and large scale projects built can deliver results.
The Burgess Hill site will also see essential, new infrastructure built with two new primary schools, a secondary school and a range of leisure facilities including a new public woodland.
‘We need to get everyone on board to build at scale and pace to build the homes this country needs. But this isn’t just about getting the numbers up. We don’t have to make a false choice between quality and quantity,’ said Brokenshire.
‘It’s also about building places that people are happy to call home. Places where they can come together in strong, thriving communities for generations to come,’ he added.
Leasehold generally applies to flats with shared spaces, making multiple ownership more straightforward, but developers have been increasingly selling houses on these terms, adding further costs to over stretched house buyers.
The Government is already working to make it cheaper and easier for existing leaseholders to buy out their freehold and improve information available about redress for those consumers who face the most onerous terms.
Changes will also be made so that ground rents on new long leases for both houses and flats are set to zero. It is estimated that there are 1.4 million leasehold houses across England and the number of leasehold sales rapidly growing.
‘We have seen leaseholders in new build homes facing unexpected costs rising every year that bear no relation to services and that’s not fair. So from now on any new Government funding scheme will contain the condition that the money cannot support the unjustified use of leasehold for new homes,’ Brokenshire concluded.
