Empty Homes – An Enduring Solution

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Levelling Up Community Regeneration

 The Government’s Levelling Up agenda has brought a renewed focus on tackling the place-based challenges that hold back many neighbourhoods; inequality and deprivation; poor quality, mismanaged private rented sector housing; and long term vacant and derelict housing. Amongst a number of proposed interventions, the Government plans to introduce measures to empower Local Authorities to bring empty homes back into use.

 In this guest blog, Brighid Carey from Action on Empty Homes discusses their new Community Action Toolkit, and the holistic and community-centred approach to building high quality homes and neighbourhoods that sits at the heart of keeping housing at the heart of a rebalanced country.

NHC members with an interest in the Levelling Up agenda are encouraged to contact Liam Gregson, Member Engagement Manager to discuss how to be involved in our work – liam.gregson@nhc.org.uk

 

Empty Homes – An Enduring Solution

Brighid Carey, Consultancy and Project Manager, Action on Empty Homes

Action on Empty Homes has launched a new Community Action on Empty Homes Toolkit, a guide for local authorities and communities working together with other partners through the process of bringing empty homes into use, to deliver affordable housing for local people. The Toolkit highlights the opportunity for new conversations and new ways of thinking, building creative collaborations to deliver lasting change.

In 2021, the number of empty homes in England stood at 238,306, a level symptomatic of a five year-trend of steadily rising numbers of long-term empty homes, despite a worsening housing crisis. Across the north of England, higher than national average concentrations of empty homes persist: in Scarborough 1 in 13 homes is empty, in Manchester it’s 1 in 30, and in Newcastle the figure is 1 in every 31 homes standing unoccupied. Recognising the scale of concern, the recently published Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill would double council tax on empty homes after one year instead of two, and enable local authorities to charge double council tax on second homes.

For communities, the cost of empty homes may be counted by the impacts on lives. Areas with high numbers of empty homes generally experience higher levels of vandalism and street crime, their residents are more likely to be in low-wage employment, and health and education indicators are poor[1]. Such areas are often characterised by high cost, poor quality privately rented accommodation[2].  Communities become trapped in a spiral of decline that can erode their confidence, lower aspirations and undermine well-being.

 

Local authorities and housing association have central roles:

·       Get your council to discuss using the Toolkit and supporting communities to bring empty homes into use, to help revitalise neighbourhoods and provide much-needed local housing

·       Housing associations – think about how you can support community action, especially through ethical divestment of street stock

·       Send communities a positive message that you’re willing to collaborate with them and support their empty homes work

·       Get in touch with AEH for more information: brighid.carey(at)emptyhomes.com

 

It’s time to ask different types of questions when it comes to empty homes. Local authorities and housing providers ask ‘How can we reduce the numbers of empty homes?’ and ‘Will enforcement work this time?’ Communities see things differently. They ask ‘How can we find somewhere decent to live?’, ‘Why are there so many homes going to waste?’  ‘How can we live well here and feel proud when it all looks so uncared for?’ What can we do about it? Communities ask questions about the things that really matter to them – they are concerned about the details of life that can make the difference between feeling well and optimistic or feeling anxious and powerless. Because of their understanding, communities are very well placed to find solutions and act to put things right – for themselves.

AEH has been working alongside communities bringing empty homes into use for the past six years. For the first three of these years, we studied six community groups, some well-established in property renovation, others at the beginning of their journey.  All had recognised unmet housing needs within their communities, had been frustrated by the numbers of homes standing empty, and had decided to do something about it.

The groups were studied represented very diverse communities. Cultures CIC in Stockton on Tees was originally formed to support individuals and groups from BME, migrant and refugee communities and help their social, economic and cultural inclusion. Cultures CIC knew that new entrants to the UK often ended up in poor quality privately rented housing and in low paid work. Working in collaboration with Thirteen HA, Cultures CIC started the process of leasing and renovating empty homes, to provide homes for community members. Cultures CIC had a very small amount of funding but through its outreach work and onsite training, was able to attract donated labour and materials.  Giroscope in Hull had decades of experience in renovating empty homes. Set up in the mid 1980’s to bring empty homes into use, Giroscope has gone from strength to strength, pulling significant capital funding into the areas of Hull where they work.

Of the communities were worked alongside, only one, Giroscope, had actually started out as a housing project. The others were community or neighbourhood groups who wanted both to create more and better affordable housing options for local people, and to address some of the underlying issues that had led to areas having long-term empty homes in the first place.

We found communities to be very effective at addressing these underlying issues. All of the community-led projects in our study provided work experience and on-site training for local people, people with vulnerabilities and people from frequently excluded groups. Some created commercial and office spaces for new community businesses such as bakeries, cycle workshops, gardening services, community shops and venues for training and events. They provided broadband services, advice and information centres and tenancy support, and a range of other services and amenities for local people. Bringing empty homes into use was the catalyst and the medium through which communities delivered the changes they wanted to see, which in turn helped to rebuild the local social and economic infrastructure.

Because communities are ‘intelligent’ about themselves, they understand the roots of issues for local people, and when empowered with leadership and decision-making, can target resources directly towards their resolution, and inspire positive lasting change.

You can download a free copy of the Community Action on Empty Homes Toolkit here.

[1] House Of Commons Briefing Paper 3012 ‘Empty Housing (England)’ (Oct 2020)

[2] Sic