Housing associations reinvest record amounts into new and existing homes
Source: gov.uk (2025-03-13)

The Regulator of Social Housing has published its latest Value for Money report.

Reinvestment in new and existing homes reached record levels as housing associations continued to focus on development, building safety, energy efficiency and stock decency, according to the new Value for Money report published today (13 March 2025) by the Regulator of Social Housing.

RSH publishes Value for Money metrics annually so boards and other stakeholders can assess how each housing association is performing against its peers.

Reinvestment into existing stock and acquisition or development of new homes increased to £14.6bn from £12.5bn in the previous year – the highest level recorded since the Value for Money metrics were introduced in 2018.

The median headline cost per property rose by 12% to £5,136 – the highest level recorded. However, the sector projects cost increases to fall below the rate of inflation over the next five years.

Following several years of high inflation, and rising borrowing costs, the financial performance of the sector has weakened. Many organisations are managing competing demands on their resources, particularly between investment in the existing stock and new supply.

However, the sector continued to sustain the high levels of new development seen in recent years, even as financial pressures intensify. Despite a number of providers scaling back development ambitions, 49,287 new social homes were delivered over the year to 31 March 2024- the highest level since 2021.

Around 10% of providers (excluding for-profit organisations) develop nearly half (45%) of new social homes.

Other key findings included:

Tall buildings are associated with high costs. Providers with over 10% of homes located in a block more than 7 storeys in height reported a headline cost of £9,343 per unit. Providers with over half of their stock categorised as house or bungalow only reported a headline cost of £4,812 per unit.

Geography matters. London has the highest capital reinvestment into existing homes, which increased by 13% to £1,680 per unit - almost 50% above the England average - but this reduced their capital reinvestment per unit into new development by 8%.

Aggregation hides variation. EBITDA MRI Interest Cover has continued to fall at a sector level, though there was a wide gap between providers in the upper quartile (153%) and those in the lower quartile (76%).

RSH also updated analysis to help explain the important factors that influence cost performance.

For the first time this analysis included new data on stock characteristics such as property height and age, deepening understanding of the factors that affect cost variation across the sector. These insights should support providers to manage their businesses effectively.

Will Perry, Directory of Strategy at RSH, said:

“The sector as a whole is proving resilient at grappling with competing demands on their resources, investing record amounts on new and existing homes, though inflation and high levels of repairs works are driving up unit costs.

“This year, we have also carried out new and expanded analysis which allows us to understand in greater detail some of the structural factors that can impact on value for money. This supports our ongoing scrutiny and regulation of the sector, especially as pressures intensify, and provides important insight for landlords as they consider what drives their businesses.

“It is crucial that landlords challenge themselves on their efficiency so they can continue to build more homes and deliver better services for people who need them.”

Notes to editors

RSH’s Value for Money metrics and reporting covers private registered providers of social housing (housing associations), excluding for-profit private registered providers. It does not cover local authority registered providers.

Value for Money (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/value-for-money-standard) is one of RSH’s standards and the report sets out housing associations’ performance against it, covering the year up to 31 March 2024.

The Value for Money report is part of RSH’s continuing work to help the sector contextualise the performance of individual providers more easily. It aims to help boards compare themselves to organisations with similar business models and geographical locations. It is an annex to RSH’s Global Accounts (https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/global-accounts-of-housing-providers), published in January 2025

Along with the report, RSH has published data for individual private registered providers. This is provided in the Value for Money metrics benchmarking tool.

As well as the 2024 Value for Money annual report we have also published new analysis looking at the drivers of variation across the sector. This analysis is summarised in the Value for Money Summary regression report, and we have also published the Value for Money technical note, which explains the metrics in greater depth. These documents and all previous Value for Money publications can be found on RSH’s Value for Money collections guidance and reports page (https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/value-for-money-guidance-and-reports).

RSH takes a co-regulatory approach to the regulation of the Value for Money standard, as we do to all the economic standards. The sector analysis is being published to support consistency and to increase transparency across the sector. We will continue to seek assurance on the outcomes of Value for Money Standard as part of the Stability Check process as well as all Inspections for providers. Our guidance and Tools will be updated accordingly to reflect our updated analysis.

For general enquiries email xxx@xxx.xx (mailto:xxx@xxx.xx). For media enquiries please see our Media Enquiries (https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/regulator-of-social-housing/about/media-enquiries) page.