ACCENT HOUSING LAUNCHES NEW SALES BRAND IN NEXT STAGE OF RENEWED DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH PLANS
Today, national housing association Accent Housing launched their new sales brand as part of the organisations renewed development ambitions following the issue of its record breaking £350 million bond in July last year.
Homemade Homes by Accent brings together all Accent’s sales activities and will market new and pre-owned shared ownership homes, manage the sales of further shares in shared ownership homes, and promote and market the association’s outright property sales – a new move for Accent.
As a housing association, Accent has provided social housing for over 50 years, but understands the aspirations people have for home ownership. While Homemade Homes by Accent is new to Accent, homeownership is not, and the association currently manages around 3,000 shared ownership and leasehold homes across the country. With a more ambitious development strategy, Homemade will enable more people to fulfil their home ownership ambitions by helping those who want to own their own home but struggle to get on the property ladder, particularly in areas where property prices are high.
Sales Director, Rob Bloom who manages the Homemade Homes by Accent brand said “With the low cost home ownership options we are offering, people will have a real opportunity to own a home close to family, friends and work they may otherwise have not been able to afford.”
“With Homemade Homes by Accent, we can promote shared ownership as a real housing choice. Many people have not considered shared ownership for a number of reasons. We want to show how it can be a real alternative for people who cannot afford to buy a home on the open market, but are not in enough ‘need’ to be considered for affordable rented housing.”
Mr Bloom continued, “The vision of our new service offer, and the financial capacity secured from Accent’s £350 million bond, means we can fulfil our commitment to our residents by providing safe and secure homes for both sale and rent. We will provide a first class customer experience and we will contribute to fixing the housing crisis by developing many more new homes, providing more opportunities and more choice.”
In many areas where Accent provides homes, demand can regularly outstrip supply by as much as 6/1 and property prices, particularly in the East and South, can well be in excess of £300,000. With affordable homes for rent only available for people in greatest need it can sometimes mean many people are just not eligible for affordable rented homes and have little chance of home ownership.
The shortfall in affordable rented homes means that many people’s only option is to look to rent privately, which often means higher costs and less security of tenure.
Mr Bloom added “thankfully, for many people, there is another affordable route to becoming a homeowner, and that is shared ownership. We want to promote the benefits of this help to buy scheme. Our homes offer affordability and long-term security. Homemade Homes by Accent is going to help make buying a shared ownership home easy and enjoyable for our customers by continually looking to improve the customer experience and by investing in new technologies.”
Accent’s Executive Director of Development & Growth, Sarah Ireland said: “We are committed to helping to fix the housing crisis. We build new homes that are affordable because, in our country, there is a deficit of homes that people can afford to live in. There is huge housing need across a range of tenures and price points across many of the areas and communities that we already work in. We want to help address that issue and provide quality, affordable homes.
"We are also committed to improving our existing homes and it is a key area of focus in our development and growth strategy. Surpluses generated from the sale of new homes will be reinvested back into Accent, for future developments and for improving the quality of the association’s existing homes.”
Accent is currently developing new homes in Bradford, West Yorkshire, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, Huntingdonshire, Milton Keynes and in Bedford, and has just completed a new development in the village of Fulbourn in South Cambridgeshire.
Shared Ownership
With soaring house prices, buying 100% of a home is beyond reach for many people in the country. Help to Buy: Shared Ownership offers people the chance to buy a share in a home, usually between 25% and 75% of the property’s full market value. Owners then pay rent on the remaining share they don’t own. There is the option to buy further shares in the property or, if owners want to move on, to sell the shares they own.
