City Hall and three London boroughs are investing £60m in a new scheme to buy around 330 private properties and rent them at “genuinely affordable” rents to people who have been, or are at risk of becoming, homeless.
The ‘Real Lettings Property Fund 2’ scheme will be run by social impact investment company Resonance Limited and homelessness charity St Mungo’s and run for nine years, at the end of which the properties will be sold on.
The scheme builds on two successful similar projects which have housed around 1,300 people to date.
Mayor Sadiq Khan is investing £15m, with the remaining money coming from Croydon, Lambeth and Westminster councils. The investments will be repaid from rental income and eventual property sales.
Resonance hope other boroughs and investors will back the scheme and help it reach its target of £100 million.
Mr Khan said: “The scale of homelessness in our capital is shocking and we are doing everything we can to tackle it.
“I will do all I can with local authorities, social enterprises, and innovative new projects to help people who are homeless or sleeping rough”
He also called on Government ministers to “fully fund services to help people who are homeless or at risk of becoming so, and tackle the long-term causes of homelessness including by investing more in social housing and reconsidering many of their changes to the welfare system.”
Daniel Brewer Managing Director of Resonance says “We are delighted that City Hall has joined other pioneering authorities, Croydon, Lambeth & Westminster, in investing into the RLPF2.
“In partnership with Real Lettings, a social lettings agency of St Mungo’s, our ambitious Homelessness Property Funds have already bought over 600 homes nationwide, housing more than a thousand people who were homeless or vulnerable to homelessness.
“We are thrilled that City Hall has caught the vision.”
