Out of Condition
Wayne Hughes, associate from CHIC’s Managing Agent ARK Consultancy talks about The Perception Gap Between Stock Condition Survey Results and Reality and Where It all Went Wrong.
It seems that we have got to a point where hardly a week goes by without another damning report, investigation or announcement by the government, housing regulator, housing ombudsman, the media or tenant advocates into the stock condition related failures levelled at social landlords.
Yet, pick up the annual report of any social housing organisation and you couldn’t help concluding that the sector has a firm grip on the condition of its stock, and whilst this is definitely the case for some, it is not the case for many.
It would also be easy to conclude on the back of recent increases in investment on existing stock (mainly directed at undertaking building safety work that mostly should already have been part of the day job) that the quality of social housing has increased by 510% and that 75% of statistics are made up.
The sector now finds the claims it makes about the condition of its stock being caught out on an alarmingly regular basis. The latest example being a sudden realisation that social housing organisations wouldn’t be able to meet the 1 October 2022 deadline for ensuring homes were fitted with basic smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, and would need to self-refer to the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH).
Read MoreCHIC’s latest webinar discusses what landlords need to know about Smoke and CO Alarm Regulations 2022 and Minimum Standards for Electrical Safety. You can find a full recording of this here
