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LiveWest boosts surplus despite ‘poor-performing’ market sale scheme

LiveWest saw its operating surplus increase 15% last year, despite a drop in its margins for social housing lettings and open market sale.

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.@WeAreLiveWest trading update shows 15% surplus increase in first full year after merger #ukhousing

In a trading update yesterday, the 36,000-home housing association said it made an £81m operating surplus for the year ending 31 March 2019, up from £69m the previous year.

Livewest was formed out of a merger between DCH and Knightstone in March 2018, and is now one of the biggest associations in the South West.

The unaudited financial results show that the group’s turnover edged up from £231m to £233m in its first full year as Livewest. Its surplus after interest payments was £56m, up 21% from £44m in 2017/18.


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The landlord’s operating margin from social housing lettings fell from 35% to 32%, while its margin for market sales fell from 19% to 15%.

The operating margin for shared ownership sales increased from 20% to 22%.

In a statement on the stock market, LiveWest said: “Operating margin on social housing lettings has fallen during the year due to an increase in planned maintenance expenditure, along with absorption of a third year of imposed rent cuts.

“Operating margin on open market sales has fallen during the year due to one poor-performing scheme which has now been completed.”

LiveWest’s housing assets increased in value from £1.86bn to £1.95bn after depreciation, while its net debt increased from £713m to £789m.

It has liquidity of £300m made up of £4m in cash and £296m of available undrawn facilities.

The group was initially called Liverty after the DCH-Knightstone merger but it was forced into a name change by a legal challenge from a similarly titled company.

It plans to build at least 15,000 homes over the next decade and has promised £12m of efficiency savings in its first three years of operation.

LiveWest completed 900 affordable homes in 2018/19, up from 812 the previous year, with a contracted pipeline of 1,835 homes.

It sold 399 homes on the open market or for shared ownership, down from 422 in 2017/18.

Credit rating agency Moody’s currently places LiveWest at A2 with a stable outlook.

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