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  • New homes target
  • Housing demand

New homes target

The Government has set a target for the number of homes that should be developed in the next decade. This is set out in the 2007 Housing Green Paper -

housing for the Future
Homes for the future: more affordable, more sustainable. -
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which sets out the Government’s ambition for additional homes,
 

The overall target is an additional 3 million homes by the year 2020. This includes newly built houses and flats and also conversions of, for example, offices to flats or of one house to a number of separate flats. There is an interim target of 2 million homes by 2016. This equates to creating around 240,000 homes a year.  Alongside this, there is a commitment to work with local government to bring more empty homes back into use.

For more on targets see the 2007 Housing Green Paper - see above

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Housing demand

Forecasts show that the number of households (i.e. individuals or a group of people requiring a separate home) is rising and housing development is not keeping pace with this rise. The population is growing and ageing, people are wanting to move into this country and changes in society mean that household sizes are shrinking. The latest household projections estimated a 223,000 per annum increase in the number of households until 2026 with a total increase between 2004 and 2029 of 5.4 million households. (www.communities.gov.uk/news/corporate/new-projection-households).

Back to Housing policy - introduction