Affordable housing

Affordable Housing is social rented, affordable rented and intermediate housing, provided to eligible households whose needs are not met by the market. Below you can find the information to assist those needing help finding an affordable home, and for developers looking to provide Affordable Housing in North East Lincolnshire.

Finding an affordable home

Find out if you can afford to buy a home on your income, which low cost home ownership scheme would suit you best, and how to find an affordable home.

Help to Buy Affordable Housing schemes are designed to help households who cannot afford to rent or buy the housing that they need on the private housing market.

Backed by the Government, the different schemes are delivered through housing associations supported by regional Help to Buy agents or directly through house builders who have signed up to the scheme and participating mortgage lenders.

There are also specialist shared ownership schemes for Armed Forces households, older persons and people with disabilities (HOLD scheme).

Affordable housing and housing need

Affordable Housing includes both social rented and intermediate housing, that are at prices or rents above those of social rent, but below market prices or rents. Affordable Housing can include sub-market renting, and affordable low cost home ownership.

‘Housing need’ refers to households who:

do not have their own housing or are living in housing which is inadequate or unsuitable
are not able to meet their needs in the local housing market without some assistance

Those in housing need are the part of the population that is not included in market demand because they do not have a high enough income to rent or buy a home on the general housing market.

A Strategic Housing Market Assessment (PDF, 4MB) was completed in 2013 outlining the current housing market situation and housing need in the North East Lincolnshire area.

Affordability is the relationship between household incomes and house prices and rents information about affordability in North East Lincolnshire can be found in the Strategic Housing Market Assessment.

The council supports the provision of Affordable Housing across the Borough by:

Working with registered social landlords and housing developers to support their bids for funding to provide more Affordable Housing
Negotiating with housing developers so that a percentage of homes build on new housing developments are affordable for rent or through low cost home ownership schemes. This is achieved through working with the planning department on section 106 planning agreements
Developing innovative approaches to increasing the supply of affordable housing which overcome restrictions to the housing market and meeting changing housing need
Ensuring that the council has up to date information on housing need so that new homes are suitable for the people who need them