£45m homes makeover bid

10:09am Thursday 24th July 2008

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Almost 500 council-owned homes could be transferred to an independent company or charity on a 125-year lease.

Brighton and Hove City Council is investigating plans to raise £45 million by leasing the homes to a new independent organisation that it will set up.

The funds will be poured into improving the 6,000 flats and houses in the city which currently do not meet the Government’s decent homes standards.

Tenants last February voted against transferring all 12,000 council homes to a housing association, leaving a £600 million black hole.

The council now hopes to hand over the leaseholds of up to 499 properties to the independent company or charity.

Consultants believe the organisation would be able to pay the council £92,000 per property by borrowing against the value of the homes. Councils are unable to do this directly.

The move comes as the council tries to save hundreds of millions in pounds in its renovation programme by moving from twoyear to ten-year contracts.

The council is looking to lease 106 temporary accommodation properties in the first year, followed by up to 393 empty properties in the next four years.

The council stresses the plans do not involve the transfer of freeholds or tenanted properties and registered social landlords, such as housing associations, will not be involved.

Councillor Maria Caulfield, cabinet member for housing, said: “Following the decision by tenants to keep their homes under council control, we’ve been looking for ways to raise capital funding to spend on improving council homes.

“Setting up this scheme would give us access to funding while respecting our tenants’ wishes.

“Our tenants voted to keep the council as their landlord and under this proposal they will remain with us, while the funding we can access will go straight into the council’s improvement programme.

We think this offers a really good option that both protects tenants and helps us carry out the improvements they deserve, but tenants are the most important part of the process and that’s why we are bringing the report to them first.”

The council says the proposal would enable the leased properties to be refurbished.

The payment of up to £45 million would represent the biggest investment in the council housing stock for a generation.

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