After welcoming residents to our latest affordable housing development, in the village of Huby, near Easingwold, we have been busy over the last few months progressing numerous other schemes across the region.
At Huby, we provided 12 new two and three-bedroom properties, which include eight rented homes and four shared ownership homes, all of which have been allocated to people with a connection to Huby or the wider Hambleton area.
They include Chris Brain and Sarah Collinson, who moved into their two-bedroom home with their nine-month-old daughter Isabella.
Chris, a truck driver, was brought up three miles from Huby in Stillington, and still has family in the village.
He said: “The house we were living in was privately rented but it was small, had single glazed windows and damp and was miles away from any local amenities.
“Now, we have a shop in the village where we can get milk for Isabella, as well as other day-to-day essentials, and a doctors’ surgery close, so the location is perfect
“More importantly, aside from the quality of the house and it being much more suitable for our needs, we are paying less than when we rented privately, so means we are able to save money and buy more things for Isabella.
“Broadacres told us to treat the home like it’s our own and that’s a massive deal, and we couldn’t be happier with the way things have worked out for us.”
Later in December, we will be handing over the last of the keys to people moving into our new development in West Witton, near Leyburn. This is our first development in the Yorkshire Dales National Park since 2008 and consists of eight two and three-bedroom homes, two of which are for affordable rent and the remaining six for discounted sale. People who work in West Witton are among those who have bought properties.
We are on site at two large schemes, Tall Trees in Yarm (where we are building over 100 homes) and Sowerby, near Thirsk (where we are providing just under 100 homes), both of which will begin to complete from spring 2022 onwards. The Sowerby development marks the first where air source heat pumps will be installed to heat properties, and this will apply to every new Broadacres development moving forward as part of sustainability strategy.
We have also received planning permission to start work on a 50-home scheme in Sedbergh, and a 25-home scheme in Hutton Rudby. We also have planning applications still to be determined on several other schemes, including a 12-bedroom apartment scheme for the elderly in Northallerton and a 9-home scheme in Burneston.
As well as delivering new homes, we are also making great progress on our purchase and repair programme which involves buying privately owned properties which have been left in a state of disrepair and carrying out the work which enables us to allocate them for affordable rent.
And with our sustainability programme in mind, we are currently carrying out a £250,000 pilot project to retrofit 5 properties to zero carbon ready standards, which will further inform our approach. This work is scheduled to complete in spring 2022.