A housing sector poised to deliver - If we let it

At Housing 2025, the mood was uncharacteristically upbeat. Not complacent - no one in this sector has that luxury - but confident. There is a clear sense that housing has been handed the tools to get on with the job.

 

The ten-year, £39 billion settlement in the recent Spending Review is not just welcome, it’s pivotal. In a sector used to one-year deals and reactive policymaking, long-term certainty is the rarest currency. It allows developers to plan, housing associations to invest, and institutional capital to commit for the long haul. Crucially, it reframes affordable housing not as a short-term welfare expense but as critical economic and social infrastructure.

 

This is the context in which private capital can and must play a larger role. Defined contribution pensions, public sector schemes, and long-term institutional investors like L&G are ready to deploy capital at scale. What we need is pipeline, clarity and partnership. If the government can maintain its course on planning reform and rent convergence, while supporting pragmatism in delivery – we heard a lot on the need for practical adjustments to S106 mechanisms – then we will see more schemes reaching viability and more homes being built.

 

But the need remains vast. The UK’s housing stock is old, expensive to heat, and largely inaccessible. Retrofitting must be seen not as a luxury, but a national infrastructure necessity. New delivery needs to match modern demographics - smaller households, later life renters, multigenerational families - and be embedded in place-based strategies that consider transport, employment, and climate resilience.

 

We should also be honest about the labour required to deliver 1.5 million homes. The construction workforce is ageing, and in many regions (Cumbria was just one example raised during the week) skills are being pulled into other sectors. If we are serious about delivery, we need a national workforce with the skills to match the funding packages and ambition of the sector.

 

Some of the most thoughtful moments at the conference weren’t grand policy pronouncements, but quiet acknowledgements of what’s working: genuine cross-sector collaboration, innovative approaches to place-making, and a renewed respect for long-termism. The challenge now is to make that the norm, not the exception.

 

If we hold our nerve, the next five years could be the time we stop talking about housing as a crisis and start talking about it as an opportunity - economic, environmental, and generational. The pieces are falling into place.

 

The question now is whether we have the urgency, discipline, and imagination to follow through.