New fund to help SME house builders

The Government has announced a new £3 billion fund to assist SME house builders tackle the housing crisis. The announcement comes after house builders called for minsters to launch the fund before the release of the Autumn Statement in November.

The fund will provide support for small-scale developers, enabling them to have access to finance, and will help to deliver 225,000 new homes.

Barriers

The Home Builders Fund, which was announced by Communities Secretary Sajid Javid at the Conservative Party conference earlier this week, will provide short-term loan funding for small builders of £1 billion, whilst £2 billion will be invested into an Accelerated Construction scheme to provide 15,000 homes on public land.

The fund has been created to assist SME house builders to produce 25,500 new houses by 2020 and to tackle the problem of a lack of access to finance, which one in two local house builders say is a major barrier to building more homes.

Significant

The new fund has been well received by the Federation of Master Builders (FMB), with Chief Executive, Brian Berry, stating: “We welcome the Government’s renewed focus on housebuilding and its recognition that without a resurgent SME sector, there’s little prospect of the country tackling its chronic under-supply of new homes.”

Discussing the benefits of the fund, he said: “The launch of a £3 billion Home Builders Fund, a significant part of which will be specifically targeted at supporting small scale developers, will tackle one of the key barriers to SME house builders – a lack of access to finance.”