City seeks building boom to meet housing shortage

At least 8500 new homes will have to be built in Edinburgh within five years if the city is to keep up with demand from a rising population.

A new city housing strategy for 2012-2017 indicates that development will need to pick up considerably if the Capital is to stave off a housing crisis.

It warns that in the five years after 2017 more than 2000 homes a year will need to be built to hit a ten-year target of 19,500 new homes.

Homes are needed across all sectors of the market, including social housing, private sale and private rent, because of projections that Edinburgh’s population will rise from 472,000 now to around 550,900 in 2033.

But property experts have labelled the targets as “ambitious” at a time when private development has almost ceased.

Steven Currie, a director of property firm Murray and Currie, said: “It is very optimistic in the current circumstances.

“If they expect private developers to build to sell in the next five years I think it will be quite tough to achieve. It is pretty risky to develop now thinking that the market will change, because it is difficult to think what will happen in six months, never mind five years.”

The targets for the next five years have been drawn up with regard to the existing land earmarked for housing, expected delivery from other sites and additional supply of land.

The city is judged to need 36,000 new homes, including 16,600 affordable homes, over the next ten years. However, it is estimated that neighbouring authorities will help tackle some of the demand, leaving 19,500 new homes needed.

It sets a target of 1500 new homes for 2012, rising by 100 each year until 2400 are due to be developed in 2021.

But Councillor Cammy Day, Labour’s housing spokesman, said: “This new target is just totally unrealistic.”

Cllr Paul Edie, the city’s housing leader, said: “It is challenging. We are using innovative funding mechanisms, prudential borrowing and regeneration land but it is a stiff test.

“It is a difficult time out there [for private developers] but a lot of it comes down to the availability of credit and one of the best ways to solve this crisis is for banks to lend to first time buyers; they didn’t cause this economic crisis.”