Concern over homes demand
By Jo Deeks on Thursday, 27th September 2001.
TWO MORE schemes for affordable housing have been approved for Haverhill town centre, at a time when the town’s housing boom is starting to mean some people are having to wait longer for homes.
St Edmundsbury Borough Council’s Housing Committee has approved a scheme for six flats in phase three of the Keebles Yard development in partnership with Hereward Housing.
The total cost of the scheme is £347,300, with £160,800 coming from the council’s social housing grant and the remainder from Hereward. Work is due to start on the scheme before Christmas, with the homes available to rent within a year.
Councillors have also approved funding to redevelop the former White Swan pub site in Mill Road to build two two-bedroom houses and two three-bedroom houses and create two five-bedroom houses by dividing the existing dwelling.
This scheme will cost a total of £790,000, with £462,000 coming from the social housing grant. The remainder of the funding would come from the Suffolk Heritage Housing Association. A planning application has been submitted for the site, but not yet determined.
Karen Mayhew, assistant director of housing for St Edmundsbury, said monitoring of the housing register had shown that it gone up slightly this year by seven per cent. This compared to a slight decrease in previous years.
The average wait on the waiting list had gone up from 28.4 months last March to 31.6 months this March. Average rents m the private sector had gone up by 10 to 15 per cent since 1998. However, there had been a dramatic increase of 40 to 63 per cent in prices for second-hand properties and a 73 per cent increase in new property prices.
Ms Mayhew said: “We do know that for a lot of people the position will be very difficult and it will limit their choices. People who would have wanted to buy may not be able to afford to.
“We are still quite fortunate that the housing prices in Haverhill are still slightly lower than the rest of the borough. We are concerned as to whether we are going to be able to provide enough affordable housing to stop the waiting list going up.”
St Edmundsbury Borough Council’s Housing Committee has approved a scheme for six flats in phase three of the Keebles Yard development in partnership with Hereward Housing.
The total cost of the scheme is £347,300, with £160,800 coming from the council’s social housing grant and the remainder from Hereward. Work is due to start on the scheme before Christmas, with the homes available to rent within a year.
Councillors have also approved funding to redevelop the former White Swan pub site in Mill Road to build two two-bedroom houses and two three-bedroom houses and create two five-bedroom houses by dividing the existing dwelling.
This scheme will cost a total of £790,000, with £462,000 coming from the social housing grant. The remainder of the funding would come from the Suffolk Heritage Housing Association. A planning application has been submitted for the site, but not yet determined.
Karen Mayhew, assistant director of housing for St Edmundsbury, said monitoring of the housing register had shown that it gone up slightly this year by seven per cent. This compared to a slight decrease in previous years.
The average wait on the waiting list had gone up from 28.4 months last March to 31.6 months this March. Average rents m the private sector had gone up by 10 to 15 per cent since 1998. However, there had been a dramatic increase of 40 to 63 per cent in prices for second-hand properties and a 73 per cent increase in new property prices.
Ms Mayhew said: “We do know that for a lot of people the position will be very difficult and it will limit their choices. People who would have wanted to buy may not be able to afford to.
“We are still quite fortunate that the housing prices in Haverhill are still slightly lower than the rest of the borough. We are concerned as to whether we are going to be able to provide enough affordable housing to stop the waiting list going up.”
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