The Thinkhouse Review: the top five must-read housing reports of 2019

Thinkhouse is a website set up to be repository of housing research. Its editorial panel of economists, chief executives, consultants and academics critiques and collates the best of the most recent housing research (scroll down for more information).

As 2019 draws to a close, it is time to nominate the most influential housing reports of the past 12 months.

While political traumas have restricted legislative capacity there has been no shortage or slowdown in the publication of research pieces, policy publications and case studies that propose ways to increase the amount and quality of the UK’s housing stock and set out the related economic, social and community benefits of doing this. In the last year, more than 150 reports were uploaded and categorised in our web library and each one was assessed by our editorial panel.

The panel is made up of 19 members, drawn from a cross section of the housing world spanning academia and research, to the not-for-profit and business sectors.

The panel assessments translate into a score which we use to rank and then showcase the top scoring reports in the ‘must-read’ section on the 2019 page.

Our panel has looked at all the reports and chose those that we think have the greatest scope to influence decision-makers. This could be either for the quality of their research, innovation or the breadth of analysis.

This year we have selected 12 reports as must-reads and ranked them.

So, here is our top five and why we selected them. If you want a quick fix of the latest and most influential thinking over your Christmas break, these are the ones you should look at.

In fifth place is a joint report from Savills for the G15, National Housing Federation and Homes for the North, Additionality of Affordable Housing, which was published in April.

It questions the likelihood of the government hitting its 300,000 new homes a year target by the mid-2020s without expanding affordable housing supply with additional grant funding.

It presents evidence to demonstrate that relying on the cross-subsidy model used to finance affordable housing and the role of private developers would result in the target not being hit.

For a great summary of the state of housing supply in the context of our current approach to public sector intervention, you can find no better read this year.

In fourth place is the Local Government Association publication Understanding Local Housing Markets. This was a timely report as local authorities, freed from the housing review account borrowing cap, are much more focused on delivering new homes, alone or in partnerships, and embedding housing in health and place making strategies.

The report featured in our August blog for Inside Housing, by editorial panel member Kerri Farnsworth, who felt that “this report provided excellent factual evidence, arranged thematically, with a clear set of recommendations, to aid decision-making and delivery impact at the local authority level. It was a must-read for all municipal actors, but also national-level policymakers”.

In third place is The Homelessness Monitor: England – published in May and authored by academics from Heriot-Watt with the University of New South Wales was commissioned by Crisis and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

This is always an eagerly awaited annual publication and one of its key themes this year is the emerging impact of the implementation of Homelessness Reduction Act in England on local authorities.