Government should lead on Rent to Buy as alternative to shared ownership, says SNG boss

Some housing associations have already “dabbled” in Rent to Buy, he said. However, “it would be great for government to convene a wider cohort of organisations from different sectors. You need to include banks and mortgage lenders and so on in that”.

Both Sovereign and Network Homes, the housing associations that merged to form 82,000-home SNG in October, have “significant programmes” of shared ownership, Mr Washer said.

“Shared ownership is not the right tenure for everybody. But what we see, certainly in parts of the former Sovereign patch, is that shared ownership has been a very successful route into homeownership more widely for many people.”

Mr Washer added that SNG is still seeing “robust interest” in the tenure despite the challenges of mortgage hikes and interest rate rises.

“We are acutely conscious of the challenges created by service charges, in some cases, for shared owners,” he continued.

“And that’s why it’s so important for people to understand the obligations that they’re taking on. But it is a successful tenure and I think it will continue to be an important tenure.

“I just think that we need to be thinking about other tenures for other cohorts of people for whom shared ownership is not right.”

Mr Washer, who was previously chief executive of 61,000-home Sovereign before the merger, said the recent tie-up would allow SNG to scale up its development ambitions.

“A lot of organisations are cutting back massively, in some cases, on their development,” he said. “We are on an upward trajectory… we are able to buck the trend.”

SNG aims to build 25,000 homes over the next decade, 5,000 more than Sovereign and Network were planning to build individually before the merger. At least half of the new homes will be for social or affordable rent.

Mr Washer also told Inside Housing that SNG’s partnership with house builder Hill Group, announced in November, will initially focus on regenerating two mid-century estates in Basingstoke.

“The main aim at this point is to go out and talk to the communities to understand what we can do together,” he said.

SNG’s first corporate plan, published this week, also pledged to establish a community foundation that will work with private, public and charity organisations and invest £100m over 10 years.

A Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities spokesperson said: “Supporting first-time buyers is a government priority, and over 873,000 households have been helped to purchase a home since spring 2010 through Government backed schemes including Help to Buy and Right to Buy.

“We offer a range of routes to help first-time buyers purchase a home that meets their needs. This includes Rent to Buy and Shared Ownership, and we support both through the delivery of our £11.5bn Affordable Homes Programme.”