Mayor's social housing fund set to deliver more affordable homes for local people

Construction has started on a £13m affordable housing development in Birmingham after it was backed by Mayor Richard Parker using a special fund he set up to provide more social rent homes.

The scheme, in Hagley Road, Edgbaston, will feature more than 50 affordable homes and is being built by WB Property Group on behalf of housing association Citizen.

Five of the new flats will now be for social rent after receiving financial support from the Social Housing Accelerator Fund (SHAF) – a £40m initiative launched last autumn by the Mayor.

Mayor Richard Parker has made the construction of more social rent housing a key priority

SHAF is part of the Mayor’s wider mission to tackle the region’s affordable housing crisis, which has left more than 7,000 West Midland families, including nearly 15,000 children, living in temporary accommodation. A further 65,000 people are on social housing waiting lists.

The Mayor created the Fund by cutting red tape to directly convert 1,000 properties that are ready for occupation, under construction, or soon-to-be-built into social rent homes -the most affordable type of housing.

“My priority since taking office has been to turbocharge the construction of more social rent housing because too many people are waiting too long for a safe, secure place to call home,” he said.

“The Accelerator Fund has already provided hundreds more social rent homes including these flats from Citizen.

“That matters because it is changing real people’s lives for the better, especially for those who have been stuck, sometimes for years, in temporary accommodation or poor-quality private rentals.”

The development will include a range of environmental features including living roofs which will be built across the flats, and solar panels will be installed on the townhouses.

Biodiversity will also be encouraged at the development through tree planting and there will be pedestrian routes throughout.

Land manager at Citizen, Amelia McCann, said: “We’re thrilled that work has started on this scheme in Birmingham. It has been a disused site for several years and it’s great to see us taking that step forward in building homes on this land.

“We’re really excited to see features in this development which support the environment. At Citizen we want to provide homes for life, and we’re also committed to providing homes that are warm, safe and well maintained.

“The development is going to be 100 percent affordable which means it will help those in Birmingham who are on the housing lists. We’re looking forward to seeing the site progress over the next few years.”

The homes on the site will be made up of 37 rent to buy flats and five for social rent and 10 rent to buy houses.

Steve Wilkes, construction director at WB Property Group, said: “This is an exciting project for us so it’s great to be on site getting stuck in. The development sets a new standard for affordable housing - the architecture, the sustainability, the placemaking, it’s all exceptional.

“We’re incredibly proud to be working with Citizen and delivering what we believe will become the benchmark for sustainable regeneration and brownfield development in Birmingham.

“We look forward to bringing this ambitious and socially impactful scheme to life, and ultimately creating much-needed high-quality, affordable homes for families in the region.”

The development is due to be completed in spring 2028.