According to the Office for National Statistics, 38,400 homes were completed between January and March 2024 — the lowest quarter for housing completions since the first quarter of 2016.

Housing completions were down from the 51,130 completed between October and December 2023.

Housing starts were up at this time. In the first quarter of 2024, work began on 29,820 homes whereas only 23,850 properties had been started in the preceding quarter.

Specifically in England, this was the worst start to the year for housing starts.

In England, 23,730 houses began construction in the first quarter. This is the weakest first quarter for starts since 2009 when 17,330 homes were begun in that period.

Overall, according to a forecast from Pocket Living this means the UK is on track to deliver 153,000 homes in 2024. This is half of the government’s annual housing delivery target and the developer has slammed government targets as “doomed to failure” as a result.

Paul Rickard, managing director at Pocket Living is critical of the efforts being made to tackle this housing shortage and said “radical” measures need to be considered.

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Referring to the government’s target to deliver 1.5 million homes, Paul said radical measures such as selling off the Homes England Help to Buy book should be considered in order to both support the SME sector and deliver affordable housing at scale.

“Doing nothing is not an option and on this trajectory the government’s objective of delivering 1.5 million new homes by 2029 is doomed to failure,” said Paul.
 
Also sceptical is Melanie Leech, CEO of the British Property Federation, who says more focus needs to be brought to the Build-to-Rent sector and other ways to unlock affordable housing delivery.

“BTR, or multi-family, is fundamental to housing supply in countries such as the US and Australia, and there is a huge opportunity through the government’s reform of the planning system to attract more long-term institutional capital to accelerate the growth of the sector in the UK and alleviate the pressure on supply in our cities,” said Melanie.

“For affordable homes the challenge is often viability, and we have called for the government to increase the level of subsidy available which would in turn unlock more private capital to work in partnership with housing associations.”