The future for affordable homes for Thame?

FINDING an affordable home in Thame is a challenge for young people who wish to remain in the town, because of high market costs for new builds and unaffordable rents, and Community Land Trusts are proving an increasingly attractive idea for local people themselves to find funding and other resources to provide truly affordable starter homes in their area.

Following a very positive reaction to a public presentation on Tuesday (15/08) explaining how a community can organise to provide affordable homes itself, Thame Town Council is to move forward and consider the next steps for Thame.

Catherine Harrington, from the National Community Land Trusts Network, explained to councillors and members of the public present how CLTs can be set up and how they are working for other communities all over the country. She showed several examples of CLTs, including those in East Cambridgeshire, Streatham and Wilburton, St Minver and Cumbria who each have there own business model eg Self-build scheme, crowd funded or support from local authorities and/or government grant schemes. The main point is, as Catherine pointed out, that a CLT is a community-lead project to meet the local need, aimed at delivering truly affordable homes at less than market value, that – importantly – remain affordable.

Most homes provided through local CLTs are either shared ownership, or available to buy at a cost around one third of the local market value, and remain affordable by the selling on of the property, not exceeding one third of the current market value. The idea is that homes are provided as homes, and not as an investment for the tenant.

The CLT Network can provide a start-up fund and loans that are repayable once the homes are build and money starts to be paid for either rental or sale of the homes. The government’s Affordable Homes Programme and it’s Community Housing Fund (funded through taxes on second homes) are other sources of possible funding as are bridging loans from developers and grants from local authorities.

Cllr Bob Austin pointed out that SODC has £850,000 in Section 106 money (contributions from developers towards the costs of providing community and social infrastructure, the need for which has arisen as a result of a new development taking place) – a fund likely to grow as more sites are developed around the town.

Charlie Fisher, from the Oxfordshire Community Land Trust, which offers support to Oxfordshire CLTs, was also at the presentation to explain how his organisation is there to help CLTs with set-up and delivery.  He mentioned a CLT in the Vale of White Horse which wants to provide 26 affordable homes in an old Victorian School.

A member of the public asked Catherine Harrington how a CLT in Thame would be able to compete with the market and how would it relate to the Local Plan. She replied: “You have got a number of sites already planned where there is an obligation to deliver a percentage of affordable homes. If you cannot compete, they will need to supply those homes. Your competition is more likely to come from Housing Associations.”

Cllr Bob Austen interjected, adding: “I won’t be easy to convince SODC to include CLTs in their Affordable Homes policy. But if we don’t make a start, we are never going to be able to keep young people in Thame. If we don’t try, we will never succeed. So far, only 6% has been allocated to local people through social housing. This is not sufficient! We have got to try and do our best for the local population.”

One of Thame’s County Councillors, Nick Carter, told the meeting that SODC seems to be mostly concentrating its attentions on affordable homes in Didcot, and that the subject was on the county council’s Scrutiny agenda. He asked Catherine Harrington how Crowd Funding etc had worked for some CLTs. She replied that Some CLTs used Crowd Funding for capital costs and set up costs (Ed. Lewisham-based RUSS CLT ) and others had used Community Share Issues . Some CLTs, she explained, lease land from a land owner.

A member of the public asked what happens when a tenant needs to make the leap to a bigger home, which could be an issue as families grow. Cllr Bob Austin replied that he saw CLTs as being dynamic and that he saw no reason why, as time went on, bigger homes could be built using the same model. Money created by the sale of homes could be invested into more homes he suggested.

“Our prime motivation is to help young people. There is a pausity of two-bed, affordable homes in Thame. The high price for three-bed homes are 8-10 times average earnings!” he added.

Another questioner asked what the allocation process would be; what would be the criteria for selection? That would be up to the CLT to establish, was the reply, but the main criteria usually includes people who have a local connection, people who are involved locally and they must be able to afford it!

Owen Davies, from the public gallery, asked about the costs of setting up a CLT. Caroline Harrington explained that it costs about £50,000 to get a scheme to the Planning stage.