communityled.homes

We support people making homes together through Cohousing, Community Land Trusts, and Housing Co-operatives

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Building Spaces for Community Inclusion

Stir to Action has launched 20 webinars in partnership with Power to Change to provide free training and peer support for those playing a vital role in their local economy during and after the crisis.
How can we create community spaces that are inclusive and harness community action? What is needed for these spaces to effectively support communities and be part of a local movement for social change? How can we ensure that our spaces engage and work with a broad range of local communities across difference?
Drawing on successful examples of community organising, this workshop offers practical steps for innovative community engagement, and offers tools for the building of inclusive and meaningful communities.
What I’ll leave with
– Basic principles of community organising and engagement and great case studies.
– Strategies for targeted outreach and culture setting.
– Strategies for building peer-to-peer support in a community space.
The facilitator
Stephanie Gamauf is a Community Organiser based in Brixton. Her background is in international development and participatory democracy. In the past she has been involved in community capacity building projects with NGOs and UN programmes in Mexico and Kenya. She has led programmes at Impact Hub Brixton and Stir to Action, and set up the community initiative ‘OurSpace’, a capacity building project to drive inclusive community spaces for social action.
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This webinar will be delivered on Zoom.
Limited capacity.
Book your free ticket here https://www.stirtoaction.com/webinars/building-spaces-for-community-inclusion

Community led housing is part of London’s future

by: Levent Kerimol

Some years ago, we would have had to look to Germany, Scandinavia, or the States to find examples of community led housing such as Baugruppen, Cohousing, or Community Land Trusts. Today London has several recently completed examples with different approaches to community led housing. This adds to a legacy of established co-operative housing projects. As the sector grows, we will undoubtedly see more innovative ideas and projects emerge from communities motivated to take control of their housing situations and contribute to housing delivery in London. There are at least 60 emerging groups and projects in London with a real diversity, which could deliver around 1500 homes.

Communities can help achieve higher densities or unlock sites that may otherwise be difficult to develop, bringing greater diversity and increased housing supply, as well as more stable, supportive, and happier neighborhoods through the empowerment of current and future residents.

Councils and housing associations have an important role to play in enabling community led housing to become a more mainstream part of housing delivery. All too often communities have seen a reluctance from what should be considered their natural partners. Where support has come from local authorities it has been in ad-hoc, one-off special cases.

The Future of London report launched today finds that this reaction is often due to a lack of understanding and trust amongst staff, and common ‘urban myths’ about what is possible. The associated learning program we supported sought to break down barriers and create an environment where council officers could feel comfortable about not knowing all the answers to this new area of housing and regeneration. There was a large emphasis on co-production, and testing concepts with projects such as PEACH and E16 CLT in Custom House.

We are here to provide practical assistance to officers. We are actively working with Tower Hamlets, Croydon and Barking & Dagenham, and seeking to build relationships between community led housing groups and housing associations who could take on an RP landlord role on their projects.

We hope to continue this learning network, to help housing associations and boroughs move from ad-hoc reactive responses to more streamlined proactive programs with a regular stream of opportunities for community groups. For example, a proportion of developments or small sites being made available specifically for community led housing through property or planning policy initiatives; or by local councils, developers, or housing associations acting as enabling developers to assist groups.

These partnerships are key to embedding the role of communities in making a positive contribution to London’s housing delivery now and into the future.

Tower Hamlets propose community led housing sites for 2020

Tower Hamlets proposes community led housing programme with site releases from 2020.

Last week Tower Hamlets became the latest London borough to detail plans to release Council-owned land for community led housing.

Under the proposed Affordable Self-Build Programme, sites will be made available to community led organisations (or individuals where sites can only accommodate a single unit) to bid via competitive process through the GLA Small Sites Portal from spring 2020.

Following similar programmes by Croydon Council and the GLA earlier this year, the proposals demonstrate local authorities growing support for community led housing and a diverse and locally driven approach to building new homes.

Significant to Tower Hamlets proposals is the requirement for 100% affordability of the homes built through the programme. Under the programme, proposals that deliver homes at London Affordable Rent level or align with average household incomes will be scored higher, with clauses in the Section 106 and leasehold covenants ensuring any affordability is protected for all future sales and lettings.

More information on the GLA’s affordable products is available in the ‘Homes for Londoners’ funding guidance.

By proposing to score bids 20% on the financial offer for the site and 80% on qualitative aspects (including community benefit and the sustainability of the scheme) Tower Hamlets has signalled a clear intention to accommodate proposals that meet the needs of local residents and which may not be viable through conventional routes.

The consultation runs until Saturday 30 November 2019.

 

More information

To find out more about the programme and to take part in the consultation, visit www.towerhamlets.gov.uk/self-build or contact self-build@towerhamlets.gov.uk

Or if you have an idea for a community led housing project then get in touch at info@communityled.homes

Community led housing development workshops

We recently held two workshops for groups we’re working with on finding a site and running a development appraisal. These activities sit at the heart of the development process and continually inform one another.

Finding a Site

The first workshop focused on what to look for and how to secure a site.

Firstly, it’s important to set a site criteria which will help you be clear on what you are looking for and why. As a group, it’s good to focus your search whilst being flexible to opportunities as they arise. The best way to search for a site is to walk or cycle around an area. Make sure you record any site or properties on a map, either digitally or physically.

Checking online maps adds a further understanding of the site and can pick up anything you may have missed on the ground. In the workshop, each group used a site search tool called LandInsight to assess sites they have been looking at. We looked at site ownership, its planning history and the comparable sale values.

We then discussed what an offer strategy looks like. Once you are invited or feel it is appropriate to make an offer, it is important that the offer is credible. All landowners will expect that an offer can proceed and proof of funding in place.

Development Appraisals

The outcomes of the site finding workshop, fed into the development appraisal workshop. A development appraisal helps check that the cost of the development is reasonable and that the project is viable. Assessing and evaluating a development is not just a one-off task, it’s a continuous process which needs constant monitoring and revisions, typically on a spreadsheet.

Our aim was to simplify what can be a daunting exercise, by explaining the different inputs of every development appraisal. We clearly identified the relationship between income and costs and how this is reflected in risk and return. Our groups looked at two examples, the first a private developer appraisal and the second, a community led appraisal. We then looked at how they can differ from each other depending on their exit strategies.

Through the Advice and Feasibility Fund, we’ve funded a number of groups to commission viability modelling which they can use to test different scenarios.

All groups can benefit from detailed financial viability modelling from consultants. The assumptions in the appraisal are important and they should be carried out by experienced valuation surveyors. As a client, you need to understand how they arrived at different costs as the decision to proceed and carry the risk, ultimately rests with you.

We have listened to the feedback from the groups who participated in the workshops and will be running further sessions in 2020. If you would be interested in attending, please contact info@communityled.homes

 

Lessons from housing coops in Zurich

Dan and Katherine are members of E16 CLT, and just returned from a group study trip to Zurich where they learnt about the important role housing co-operatives play in providing secure, affordable community led housing. We asked them what key lessons could be learnt from Zurich.

1. Scaled up community-led housing is possible when the support is there

Out of 220,000 Zurich homes, 39,000 belong to housing co-operatives, which means 17.7% of all housing is community-led and owned by co-op members. How is this possible? Well, a big factor is that the city of Zurich is very supportive of housing co-ops and so are the Zurich Canton (the regional government). The city works with housing co-ops, by identifying land that could be developed and inviting co-ops to submit ideas. They don’t ask for huge upfront payments on the land, instead the co-op pays an annual sum (linked to the value of the land and what they built) for the lease which usually lasts 70 years.

The city makes sure the housing is good quality by requiring architectural competitions are held and ensuring strict environmental regulations that are kept to. Working together like this means that co-ops can charge a ‘cost-rent’, so tenants pay the exact cost necessary and no profit is made.

In addition to this, finance is easier to raise. Due to co-ops prevalence and success, banks do not see them as a high risk and will lend to co-ops with as little as 7% of the capital. Investment is also available from public pension funds and sometimes co-ops invest in each other. This level of support means the sector is thriving.

 

2. You can combine lots of different types of housing successfully

We toured two housing co-ops in Zurich – Mehr As Wohnen and Kalkebreite. Both co-ops have a mix of housing that reflects the different needs of people within the community. For example, they mixed family housing, flat shares aimed at younger people and ‘cluster flats’ aimed towards older people who don’t want to live alone. In these cluster flats, residents have one or two private rooms and bathroom, and share a large living area and kitchen. These were also easily adapted for the benefit of disabled residents who wanted to live with others. In total, over 100 people are living like this in Mehr As Wohnen co-op. In Kalkebreite co-op, they also have what they call ‘Joker Rooms’ in the block which tenants can rent for anything between 6 months and 4 years. These rooms prevent overcrowding when a family member come stay, or can help adult children live semi-independently in the same building.

Co-ops do not make a surplus and provide most of their housing at an affordable ‘cost-rent’. Social housing is subsidised by the state and the co-op work with organisations to provide specialist, accessible housing. All of this within one development. 

3. Co-ops provide much more than just housing

The two co-ops we visited offered more than housing, with non-residential space dedicated to work and social uses. They have offices (Greenpeace have an office in Kalkebreite), cafes, a bakery, shops and meeting spaces for local people and residents to use. Kalkebreite also had four ‘Box Rooms’, simple rooms in the corridor of a block where residents get to choose what they were used for. They include a kids room as well as space for fitness, yoga and sewing. Kalkebreite co-op has around 250 residents and another 250 people working there. They also have a large square open for the public to enjoy alongside residents and workers. Each co-op also had an array of shared facilities, like laundry rooms, a library, sauna or bike park and were able to provide energy to the co-op by installing solar panels on the roofs.

E16 CLT was established in 2018 by the People’s Empowerment Alliance for Custom House (PEACH), a resident-led response to the proposed regeneration of Custom House.

Read more about their organisation here