Government pledges £200m to buy up new homes

The Government has announced plans to purchase newly built properties from housing developers whose sales are plummeting.

The £200 million scheme could provide 1,000 homes that can either be rented out by social landlords or offered to first-time buyers who can purchase the properties through the existing Homebuy scheme.

The plans forms part of the Government’s “Preparing Britain for the Future” initiative, which will also provide an additional £100 million for shared equity schemes.

Access to the schemes will be extended beyond key workers, to all first-time buyer households with an income under £60,000.

The Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) has welcomed the proposals, pointing out that they remove an anomaly whereby key workers were singled out for special treatment while other workers on modest salaries were ignored.

The CML does not expect the changes to have a significant impact on the housing market.

The initiative is, however, good news for housebuilders who will be able to offload some of their stock.

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