Prime Minister David Cameron and his deputy Nick Clegg will unveil a £400m fund to build 16,000 houses, to reverse the slow rate of house building, and stimulate the economy.
The ‘Get Britain Building’ initiative will focus on ‘shovel ready’ construction sites where work has stalled.
The government is aiming to build an additional 450,000 new homes by 2015. Developers will compete for funds and building work on selected schemes could start next July. It is hoped that up to 3,200 of the proposed new properties will be affordable homes and that the initiative will support up to 32,000 jobs.
The initiative is part of the new government housing strategy, also launched today, which includes a scheme worth hundreds of millions of pounds to underwrite a small percentage of mortgages for new-build homes. It is designed to reduce the size of a deposit, particularly for first-time buyers, by shifting the loan-to-value ratio. Banks are currently demanding deposits of up to 20% of the value of a property from first-time buyers.
