Rural Affordable Housing

Affordable housing at West Dean

Hastoe Housing Association

What we do at AirS

By Tom Warder

As the Rural Housing Enabler for Action in rural Sussex it is great to hear about the work of the Changing Estates project. The heritage and history of these estates has been vital to the well being of villages across Sussex by providing affordable homes for local people and ensuring that these places remain thriving and well balanced communities.

Why is affordable housing so important to rural communities?
A combination of very high house prices and a reduction in the number of affordable homes through the Right to Buy policy has resulted in many young people and families having to move away to towns and cities to find affordable housing. The impact this is having on rural communities is very detrimental, breaking up family networks - with the subsequent loss of intergenerational support that this entails - and threatening the viability of key services such as shops, schools, post offices and pubs. The Rural Affordable Housing Commission has recommended that more rural affordable housing should be built to redress this situation in order to maintain the sustainability of villages and rural communities. More recently Mathew Taylor MP states in his much lauded Review entitled Living, Working Countryside;

"If we fail to build the affordable homes to enable the people who work in the countryside to live there we risk turning our villages into gated communities of wealthy commuters and the retired ."

The recession has made affordability problems worse as a result of more expensive mortgages and requirements for larger deposits, consequently rural repossessions and homelessness have risen dramatically. And yet as Mathew Taylor points out;

"In many cases just a handful of well designed homes, kept affordable in perpetuity for local people, will make all the difference to the sustainability of a village and its services."

In order to address this issue we work closely with rural communities and their parish councils, local authorities, landowners and specialist rural housing associations to improve the provision of affordable housing in rural areas. For further information about this process or rural affordable housing in general please contact Tom on the number below.

Tom Warder
Rural Housing Enabler (AirS)
Tel: 01273 479 008
E-mail: tom.warder@ruralsussex.org.uk