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Midlands housing association Longhurst Group has raised £250m through a bond issue.
The 22,500-home landlord hopes to use the proceeds to step up its development programme, delivering 700 homes a year until 2024, including 600 affordable units.
It has drawn down £150m immediately, with the remaining £100m retained.
Priced at 1.48% above the cost of government borrowing, the bond is repayable after 25 years. It has a 3.25% coupon.
This is the second time Longhurst has issued a public bond. The first, also for £250m, was issued in 2012 by treasury facility Libra (Longhurst Group) Treasury PLC at 2.48% more expensive than government borrowing.
The most recent bond, issued through Libra (Longhurst Group) Treasury No. 2, was more than two times oversubscribed, Longhurst said. The vehicle had been assigned an A3 credit rating by Moody’s.
Rob Griffiths, deputy chief executive and chief financial officer at Longhurst, said: “We’re very pleased with the results from our latest bond issue and the level of interest from investors.
“We will be using the proceeds from the bond issue to fund our forward development programme where we are looking to deliver around 700 much needed new homes each year for affordable rent, low cost home ownership and market sale.
“This is another significant step in the group’s history. It makes us stronger financially, will help us realise our ambitious growth plans and continue to improve the lives through the provision of more homes.”
Longhurst merged with 2,300-home Axiom in July last year.
Mike Roche, director at Savills Financial Consultants who advised Longhurst, said: “There was great investor appetite for this bond, demonstrating the strong support for Longhurst’s plans to continue to grow its business and support its communities.”