EHS Briefing: Modelling a revised Decent Homes Standard for consultation
A statistical report covering analysis of English Housing Survey data used in developing a revised Decent Home Standard for consultation in July to September 2025.
Applies to England
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The government is consulting (2 July to 10 September 2025) on a proposal to update the Decent Homes Standard (DHS), which currently sets a minimum housing quality standard for all registered providers of social housing.
The government also proposes to extend the standard to cover private rented sector dwellings. This reflects the considerable challenges facing our existing, ageing housing stock, with the aim of driving significant quality improvements over time. This update will benefit tenants and wider society through the links that housing quality has to health, employment, crime, environmental and wellbeing outcomes.
To inform development of the revised standard for consultation, MHCLG has:
- commissioned the Building Research Establishment (BRE) to analyse English Housing Survey (EHS) physical survey data from 2019 to estimate whether dwellings would pass or fail the update to the Decent Homes Standard that the government is consulting on, including the potential cost of bringing homes up to the revised standard; and
- undertaken further analysis of the housing quality data contained in the EHS
The key findings of this work are covered in this statistical publication. They have informed the Impact Assessment that accompanies the government’s consultation. The Impact Assessment sets out the government’s full assessment of the cost and benefits of its proposal, concluding that it should deliver significant net benefits to tenants and wider society.