Author: effective

The huge financial hurdle facing first-time home buyers has been with us for decades, and just keeps getting worse and worse.  Everybody knows this by now.  But so far, a solution has eluded us.  This article will argue that we now, at last, have the basic regulations in place to create a solution. An issue…

The First Homes Scheme provides homes to first-time buyers at a substantial discount to market price.  The minimum discount is 30%.  This scheme is now the Government’s preferred home ownership option within Affordable Housing.  The Government’s stated intention is that it should account for at least 25% of the Affordable Housing units being built.  This…

There is an excellent introduction to Exception Sites in this article in “Planning Insight” of April 2021: https://www.planninginsight.co.uk/blogs/first-homes-and-exception-sites/. The concept of an Exception Site derives from paragraph 71 of the National Planning Policy Framework  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-planning-policy-framework–2. Rural Exception Sites are well covered in this article.  https://www.communityledhomes.org.uk/planning/44 There are currently three types of Exception Site: Rural, Entry-level,…

East Cambridgeshire has led the way in the provision of heavily discounted homes for first-time buyers.  Specific local conditions have been a big part of what has driven this.  Cambridge City has become a fast-growing high-tech hub.  The city itself is becoming increasingly unaffordable, even for well-paid high-tech professionals.  As a result, they are moving…