ROOF Blog

The Tenant Services Authority is offering social landlords small grants to help them develop ‘local deals’ with their tenants. Grants up to £9,000 will be made available to housing associations, councils and arm’s length management organisations to improve services in response to local needs.

Two housing associations have merged to create one of the UK’s largest housing groups with more than 30,000 homes across the South and South West. Sovereign housing group and Wessex housing partnership became the first group amalgamation since the Tenant Services Authority was formed.

The needs of vulnerable people will be protected in the Tenant Services Authority (TSA) regulatory framework. Speaking at the national sheltered and supported housing congress, head of the TSA Peter March said that coordination between tenant, landlords and their stakeholders is key to ensuring vulnerable tenants get the best service possible. The TSA consulted with more than 27,000 tenants to develop the standards which will apply to all social landlords from April 2010.

The Tenant Services Authority (TSA) said that housing associations have made a promising start clearing the backlog of unsold low cost homes. During the past quarter (January - March 2009) the number of unsold properties fell 16 per cent, and the number of homes unsold for more than six months dropped 19 per cent. TSA chief executive Peter Marsh said that housing associations had sold more homes than they converted to rented social housing in the last quarter, indicating that associations were adapting to the changing market.

The Tenants Services Authority should not over regulate housing associations, chief executive of the National Housing Federation David Orr has warned. Mr Orr said he welcomed the creation of the TSA, but said it must be clear about the purpose and limitations of regulation. He said the TSA should be wary of encroaching too far on associations’ rights and responsibilities.

Social tenants should expect the same high quality service, irrespective of their landlord, Peter Marsh, chief executive of the Tenants Services Authority, said yesterday. He said that by spring 2010 the TSA aims to regulate all providers of social housing including arms length management organisations (ALMOs), housing associations and local authorities. It will be the first time social housing tenants will all be regulated in the same way.

The Tenant Services Authority has completed a study into tenant involvement in housing management and concluded that they want more involvement, but barriers mean this might not happen. The report found that there is a link between satisfaction and involvement in general, with tenants who have a good relationship with their providers more likely to feel empowered and involved. A minority of tenants did not want to get involved in property management because they were satisfied with the service they were receiving, while others wondered how much influence their involvement could have.

The Tenant Services Authority has announced that the housing association sector turnover was more than £10 billion for the first time in 2008. Turnover was up by 10.7 per cent and the value of housing association properties was up 10 per cent, as construction of new homes and the transfer of homes from local authorities to housing associations increased.

Social housing landlords need to focus more on their tenants and involve them in making decisions on services, Peter Marsh of the Tenant Services Authority has said. He argues that involving residents within all aspects of their community improves day to day services, including management and maintenance, and provides a ‘solid basis’ for developing relationships between tenants and landlords.

The number of unsold housing association homes has peaked at more than 10,000, an increase of 20 per cent, according to chief executive of the Tenant Services Authority Peter Marsh. In total there were 10,060 housing association homes worth £707 million that are still unsold, with nearly 5,000 unsold for more than six months, an increase of 405 since November. Many of the houses, which were earmarked for shared ownership, will be turned back to rented property for social housing or at intermediate rates, with help from the Homes and Community Agency. Mr Marsh said he hoped that associations would begin to increase their build programmes once they had reduced the number of unsold homes.