Member Article

Developers invited to invest in Manchester’s housing future

A strengthened alliance between Manchester City Council and the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) to provide a major stimulus to residential development in the city has been announced.

The partnership, Manchester Place, will create a pipeline of development-ready sites to help the city meet its ambitious target of creating 55,000 new homes by 2027 as set out in the Manchester Residential Growth Prospectus.

Manchester Place will work with investors, such as Manchester Life, as well as developers and others who wish to support high quality housing across the city to ensure there are sufficient opportunities. In some circumstances, this could include providing access to public resources.

Forecasts suggest that the city has the potential to generate an extra 50,000 jobs by 2023 and that by 2030 the population will exceed 600,000. Ensuring the right number of homes in high quality neighbourhoods is a key challenge.

Key tasks for Manchester Place include working with landowners to get sites ready for development, assembling land where necessary, and using the land resources and market intelligence of both the Council and HCA to produce a co-ordinated response to government initiatives encouraging house-building.

Receipts from land sales will be recycled for housing and associated developments supporting growth.

An annual investment plan will identify priority areas for public and private sector investment which can unlock residential growth. These will be designated as Investment Action Areas, with Ancoats and New Islington one of the first.

Councillor Jeff Smith, Executive Member for Housing and Regeneration, said: “Manchester Place will secure an integrated approach by Manchester and the HCA to stimulating faster and wider interest in the city’s housing market.

“We welcome conversations with other investors, both international and UK-based, about the many opportunities in the city and will engage with landowners and developers to create a development pipeline for all investors and developers willing to support our residential growth strategy.

“This is a significant partnership which should have a huge positive impact on Manchester’s housing market.”

Deborah McLaughlin, North West Executive Director at the HCA, said: “Manchester Place captures the strong working relationship that has developed between the City Council and the Homes and Community Agency, and is a great demonstration of how we can jointly use pioneering investment models to stimulate growth.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Simon Malia .