The Week in Housing: Spotlight on Regeneration series launched, plus flurry of regulatory and development issues

Amid concern that redevelopment schemes are becoming trickier to get off the ground in some parts of the country, Inside Housing is partnering with the Northern Housing Consortium and PlaceShapers on a new series focused on the delivery of housing-led regeneration schemes across the UK.

The Spotlight on Regeneration series kicked off with an article on the difference redevelopment made to an estate in Walthamstow, north-east London, that went beyond housing.

Inside Housing also visited Waverley, a new town in South Yorkshire, to see the transformation of Orgreave Colliery, where miners and police clashed in the 1980s.

We considered the board’s role in a successful regeneration project and how to go about carrying out a meaningful tenant consultation for estate redevelopment.

We also looked at what is stopping regeneration projects from getting off the ground and how to restart redevelopment.

While we search for an answer, a council in Essex has drawn up its own plans for regenerating a run-down housing estate left unfinished after its previous housing association partner, Swan, ran into financial difficulty.

Trading updates for social landlords continue to paint a mixed picture. North West landlord Onward Homes delivered 434 homes in 2024-25, its highest annual total to date.

Large housing association The Guinness Partnership recorded a loss of £10.8m in its latest financial results after being hit by rising costs and contractor insolvencies.

This was followed by landlord PA Housing revealing that it had put a “deliberate pause” on new projects last year after contractor insolvencies led to an impairment of £5.2m.

There was good news for major association Places for People after it heard it can start work on an 8,500-home garden town in Hertfordshire this year after a legal challenge to the site’s planning approval was thrown out.

In Wales, Cardiff and Vale of Glamorgan councils have entered a partnership with house builder Lovell to build 2,500 homes over the next 10 years.

Housing ombudsman Richard Blakeway believes the sector is showing the “first signs of improvement” after the watchdog’s annual report recorded a small drop in the maladministration rate.

Coastline Housing and B3Living were among four housing associations to have received the top consumer grade in the English regulator’s latest batch of judgements.

In the same batch, a council on the Essex coast was handed a non-compliant consumer rating by the Regulator of Social Housing after it uncovered failings, including homes that had not been surveyed for over a decade.

A separate report from the regulator showed a slight fall in the number of social housing blocks that still have no clear remediation completion date.

The UK’s competition watchdog is launching an investigation into the takeover of a student landlord by a rival group.

More than 40 people were forced to flee their homes due to suspected arson attacks at two social housing blocks in London and Plymouth in the past week, and a man has now been charged following the fire in the capital.

The latest analysis by housing data company Housemark found that social landlords in the UK have reduced the number of vacant homes in their stock to a three-year low.

There were a number of other insight pieces published this week. As the government published the outcome of its consultation on Compulsory Purchase Order reform, we asked the sector if the changes will help build more affordable homes.

The global head of real estate and housing at Lloyds Bank sat down with us to discuss shared ownership, retrofit loans and for-profit housing providers.

We also published an extract from Peter Apps’ new book, in which he traces London’s journey from the relative security of the 1980s to the chaos of the present day.

Have a great weekend.

Stephen Delahunty, news editor, Inside Housing

Say hello: stephen.delahunty@oceanmedia.co.uk

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