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Wheatley pockets first slice of EIB’s low-interest loan

Wheatley Group, Scotland’s largest housing association, has drawn down the first tranche of an £185m loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB) as it aims to build 7,500 homes across the country. 

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Picture: Getty
Picture: Getty
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Wheatley pockets first slab of EIB loan at low interest rate #ukhousing

The 80,000-home association has secured a £85m loan at an interest rate of “under” 1.5%.

The loan, which took two years to sign off, was first announced in July last year amid concern of a slowdown in EIB lending to associations since the Brexit vote.

Wheatley, which is the UK’s largest developer of housing for social rent, said the funding will support the next phase of its building programme, which includes 1,400 new properties. It will also use the money to upgrade “thousands” of existing properties.

The association, which had its credit outlook upgraded in May, is planning to build 7,500 new homes by 2025. The group’s chief executive, Martin Armstrong, told Inside Housing in May that it expects to spend £1.2bn on new and existing homes over the next five years.


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Alastair MacNish, Wheatley’s chair, welcomed the interest rate secured on the loan.

“The low interest rate represents a real vote of confidence in our organisation and the sector more widely, and provides us with the means to invest significantly in our housing stock and communities, with projects that will deliver top quality, green homes for the future,” he said.

Wheatley, which operates in 17 local authority areas in Scotland, last week reported a £7.2m post-tax loss that it blamed on changing the way it measures its homes’ depreciation. Its revenue rose 9% to £333.6m.

In 2018/19, the group built 640 homes for social rent and another 240 for mid-market rents. It does not build housing for sale.

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