I did a fair bit of housing association stuff around there, but they just couldn’t compete with the retirement village firms buying up all the land on Stafford Road.
Office for National Statistics Projections, in most areas, suggest that the largest single area of housing need is in the over 55 age bracket. As such, there is a well rehearsed argument in planning circles that the provision of specialist age restricted housing for older people has the direct knock on effect of freeing up otherwise under-occupied housing stock, and therefore ‘feeds’ the housing chain. The age restriction is embedded within a legal agreement that the developer has to voluntarily enter into, and which subsequently becomes a land charge.
Providers of specialist older persons housing generally get away without having to provide affordable housing on site because of the communal facilities incorporated. The provision of those communal facilities is funded by a residents’ service charge (usually inordinately high) which would be incompatible with affordable housing. The providers will sometimes be asked for a financial contribution towards off site provision of affordable housing - but they will argue tooth and nail that they should not be liable. For example, Sadiq Khan recently introduced guidance for London that would have required affordable housing provision within older persons housing. A consortium of providers clubbed together to challenge that requirement in the courts, and won.