The government’s housing delivery agency has made significant investments with two of the UK’s largest retirement home developers.
In August, Homes England agreed to loan Audley Group £40m from its £4.5bn Home Building Fund for the construction of 255 homes in its first retirement village.
The Mayfield retirement village will also include a restaurant, swimming pool and fitness facilities and is situated near Watford General Hospital. It forms part of Watford’s larger Riverwell regeneration project.
Now, this month, McCarthy Stone has been given strategic partnership status with agency and has also been successful in its bid for grant funding to deliver 1,500 new affordable shared ownership properties over the next five years.
The units are set to be delivered nationwide, with the majority found in the Midlands and North of England. The company argues that, by opening access to high-quality retirement communities, it will help deliver the government’s much-disputed ‘levelling up’ agenda, by providing more older people with a diverse mix of specialist housing while also helping to create additional employment opportunities for local communities.
The firm says that retirement communities are also proven to have significant socio-economic benefits, helping older people feel happier and healthier whilst freeing up the housing market and boosting local economies.
Direct government intervention to promote the building of retirement housing is just one way of helping to encourage the older population to downsize, and thereby boost the number of available family homes on the market.