Government funding to help bring empty homes back into use

Community and voluntary organisations will now be able to bid for part of £100m Government funding for pioneering housing schemes that will ensure empty properties that ruin neighbourhoods are lived in once again, and at the same time provide affordable housing. Many of these schemes will also have wider benefits such as providing excellent training opportunities for local people. Previously only conventional housing providers could apply.

There are some 700,000 empty homes across the country.

The Government will also consult in due course on plans to allow councils local discretion to introduce a council tax premium on homes in their area that have been empty for more than two years, to provide a stronger incentive to get the homes back into productive use and remove the blight from such properties on local neighbourhoods.

With the New Homes Bonus applying to empty homes as well as new ones, councils can also receive six years worth of funding for every home they bring back into use. By including empty homes brought back into use within the New Homes Bonus, the Government is also giving councils the same financial rewards for bringing an empty home back into use as building a new one - nearly £9,000 for a band D property.

Already in year one of the New Homes Bonus, just under 16,000 long term empty homes were brought back into use, equating to a reward for councils of around £19m.

Formal bidding guidance for community groups who want to apply for Government funding will be published shortly. In the Autumn the Government will also publish its approach to tackling empty homes, as part of the wider Housing Strategy.