Decision

GreenSquareAccord Limited (LH3902) - Regulatory Judgement: 29 October 2025

Updated 29 October 2025

Applies to England

Our Judgement

	Grade/Judgement	Change	Date of assessment
Consumer	C2 Our judgement is that there are some weaknesses in the landlord delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and improvement is needed.	First grading	October 2025
Governance	G2 Our judgement is that the landlord meets our governance requirements but needs to improve some aspects of its governance arrangements to support continued compliance.	Downgrade	October 2025
Viability	V2 Our judgement is that the landlord meets our viability requirements. It has the financial capacity to deal with a reasonable range of adverse scenarios but needs to manage material risks to ensure continued compliance.	Assessed and unchanged	October 2025

Reason for publication

We are publishing a regulatory judgement for GreenSquareAccord Limited (GSA) following an inspection completed in October 2025 and to confirm the removal of its regulatory notice.

This regulatory judgement confirms a consumer grade of C2, a governance downgrade to G2 and a financial viability grade of V2.

Prior to this regulatory judgement, the governance and financial viability grades for GSA were last updated in January 2025 following a stability check which confirmed grades of G1 and V2.

This is the first time we have issued a consumer grade in relation to this landlord. However, a regulatory notice was published in October 2021, as a result of GSA not meeting the intended outcomes of the Home Standard, which was in place at that time. The regulatory notice concluded that GSA had failed to meet statutory health and safety requirements in relation to fire, electrical and asbestos safety, which had the potential to cause serious detriment to GSA’s tenants. We carried out responsive engagement with GSA following the publication of the regulatory notice and considered the issues within it through the inspection.

Summary of the decision

From the evidence and assurance gained during the inspection we have concluded that there are some weaknesses in GSA delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and improvement is needed, specifically in relation to the outcomes in our Safety and Quality Standard and our Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard. Based on this assessment, we have concluded a C2 grade for GSA.

Our judgement is that GSA meets our governance requirements but needs to improve some aspects of its governance arrangements to support continued compliance, specifically in relation to board oversight of operational delivery and risks, and strengthening its internal control arrangements. Based on this assessment we have concluded a G2 grade for GSA.

Our judgement is that GSA meets our financial viability requirements and has the financial capacity to manage a reasonable range of adverse scenarios. GSA continues to meet covenant requirements, however, increased investment in existing stock has weakened its financial profile and has reduced its capacity to respond to adverse events. GSA’s disposal programme also exposes it to sales risks. Based on this assessment, we have concluded a V2 grade for GSA.

How we reached our judgement

We carried out an inspection of GSA to assess how well it is delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and meeting our governance and financial viability requirements, as part of our planned regulatory inspection programme. During the inspection, we considered all four of the consumer standards: Neighbourhood and Community Standard, Safety and Quality Standard, Tenancy Standard, and the Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard.

During the inspection we observed a board and operations committee meeting and customer panel, spoke with tenants, held meetings with GSA including its non-executive directors, interviewed staff, and reviewed a wide range of documents provided by GSA.

Our regulatory judgement is based on a review of all the relevant information we obtained during the inspection as well as analysis of information supplied by GSA in its regulatory returns and other regulatory engagement activity.

Summary of findings 

Consumer – C2 – October 2025 

The Safety and Quality Standard requires landlords to identify and meet all legal requirements that relate to the health and safety of tenants in their homes and communal areas and ensure that all required actions arising from legally required health and safety assessments are carried out within appropriate timescales.

Through our inspection, GSA provided evidence it was continuing to address fire safety remedial actions identified following an accelerated programme of fire risk assessments as part of a structured programme. However, there is still a significant number of actions, including some that are overdue and high priority. We will continue to engage with GSA while it finishes its programme of remedial actions, scheduled to be completed by April 2026, to ensure it has appropriate mitigations in place to keep tenants’ homes safe.  

We gained assurance over GSA’s delivery of outcomes in other areas of landlord health and safety including in relation to electrical and asbestos safety. 

The Safety and Quality Standard requires landlords to have an accurate and up-to-date understanding of the condition of their homes at an individual property level based on a physical assessment of all homes. We gained assurance that GSA has a good understanding of the condition of its homes, through a rolling programme of physical stock condition surveys that underpins its reporting on compliance with the Decent Homes Standard, and informs its investment plans. GSA has an established approach to managing issues in tenants’ homes relating to damp, mould and condensation. There is a need however for reporting and oversight to be strengthened in this area.

The Safety and Quality Standard requires landlords to have an effective, efficient and timely repairs service. We saw evidence of fluctuating performance in delivering repairs service improvements. Reporting indicates that the time taken to complete a repair has reduced, but there remains a significant backlog of overdue repairs. We will monitor progress as part of our ongoing engagement to ensure delivery of sustained improvements. We gained assurance that there are arrangements in place so that information on vulnerabilities is used to prioritise tenants’ repair requests.

In relation to the Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard, we saw evidence that GSA treats its tenants with fairness and respect. Through the inspection, we have assurance that the customer panel has opportunities to influence a range of services, but that the impact of these opportunities was not always clear. GSA is in the early stages of delivering its customer involvement and empowerment strategy and a forward engagement plan for scrutiny was being developed. We will continue to monitor progress in this area with GSA. 

GSA acknowledges that there is more it can do to strengthen its approach to using relevant information to understand the diverse needs of tenants and to assess whether its housing and landlord services deliver fair and equitable outcomes for tenants. A programme of tenant visits supports this approach to collecting data.

GSA has initiated some changes to its complaints handling service to improve the timeliness and quality of its responses. We have assurance that performance is improving and that reporting will be expanded to clearly identify any use of extensions of time to respond to a complaint. The level of complaints from tenants is relatively high and highlights that better outcomes for tenants need to be sustained. GSA is reviewing how it can further improve and we will continue to engage with GSA to ensure it is delivering a timely complaints handling service for tenants. 

GSA provides tenants with accessible information about its performance and landlord services including a monthly infographic on its website.

In relation to the Neighbourhood and Community Standard, GSA’s approach to anti-social behaviour (ASB) is set out clearly in its policy, which is accessible on its website alongside information to tenants on how to raise ASB issues and report hate crime. We have assurance that GSA works in partnership with other organisations and undertakes a range of measures to support tenants experiencing ASB. We also saw evidence that it is allocating and letting its homes in a fair and transparent way and is supporting tenants to maintain their tenancies. 

Governance – G2 – October 2025

Based on evidence gained from the inspection, we have assurance that GSA meets our governance requirements but needs to improve some aspects of its governance arrangements to support continued compliance with the Governance and Financial Viability Standard.

GSA provided assurance that its governance arrangements are effective in delivering its strategic objectives and we saw evidence of decision making by the board in response to increasing financial risks. GSA has put in place plans to exit from loss making activities and has sought external advice as appropriate.

However, there has been underperformance over a prolonged period of time, resulting in the write-off of loans and impairments.

We saw evidence that GSA’s board provides scrutiny and challenge at a strategic level, however we also saw evidence that the board’s oversight of operational activities and level of assurance on the effectiveness of internal controls in place was insufficient. Although we gained assurance that GSA’s board provides scrutiny and challenge at a strategic level, there remains weaknesses in some aspects of oversight and risk management, including in development cost control and contractor management. GSA has been proactive in commissioning appropriate external review and support, and we will monitor progress as it implements improvements.

The quality of financial reporting received by the board and its committees is sufficient to allow oversight of GSA’s key financial risks although more consideration of how the board utilises its financial golden rules is required.

GSA has an appropriately skilled and experienced board and a structured, thorough process for developing and appraising board skills and supporting succession planning activity. We saw evidence of appropriate arrangements in place for the board to assess its effectiveness and to ensure continuous improvement in GSA’s governance. GSA commissioned an external governance effectiveness review in May 2025 and we have assurance that the board will be taking forward the recommendations. 

GSA’s data quality, integrity and governance needs further strengthening. It is managing increased risk due to inadequate systems and an over reliance on manual processes to produce reliable data. GSA has plans in place to improve its systems, manage data quality and implement a digital delivery plan.

The board needs to reflect further on these areas and respond fully to lessons learned to ensure that improvements are consistent and sustainable. Robust oversight of plans to improve data quality, internal controls and outcomes for tenants in relation to repairs and fire remedial actions is required and our regulatory engagement with GSA will continue as this progresses.

Viability – V2 –  October 2025

Based on the evidence gained through the inspection we have concluded that there is appropriate assurance that GSA’s financial plans are consistent with and support its financial strategy. GSA has evidenced that it has an adequately funded business plan, sufficient liquidity and security in place to support its financial plans. It is forecast to continue to meet its financial covenants under a reasonable range of adverse scenarios and there is effective oversight of covenant compliance with regular performance reporting to the board.

GSA’s increased investment in its existing homes is putting pressure on financial performance. Its capacity to respond to adverse scenarios has been significantly reduced and a significant disposal programme exposes GSA to material risks that will need to be managed.

We will continue to monitor GSAs financial performance and capacity to respond to adverse scenarios closely on an ongoing basis.

Background to the judgement

About the landlord

GSA was formed through the merger of GreenSquare with Accord Housing Association in April 2021. It operates in 38 local authority areas across the West Midlands, Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire and Wiltshire and owns and manages around 26,000 homes. It also develops new homes and provides care and support services.

GSA employs the full-time equivalent of around 1,589 staff. Its turnover for the year ended 31 March 2025 was £221m.

GSA owns four active unregistered subsidiaries including GreenSquareHomes that develops and sells properties for market sale built as part of GSA’s development programme, and LowCarbonLiving Homes, a timber frame manufacturing business. 

GSA is a strategic partner of Homes England and expects to deliver around 406 homes over the next two years. 

Our role and regulatory approach

We regulate for a viable, efficient, and well governed social housing sector able to deliver quality homes and services for current and future tenants.

We regulate at the landlord level to drive improvement in how landlords operate. By landlord we mean a registered provider of social housing. These can either be local authorities, or private registered providers (other organisations registered with us such as non-profit housing associations, co-operatives, or profit-making organisations).

We set standards which state outcomes that landlords must deliver. The outcomes of our standards include both the required outcomes and specific expectations we set. Where we find there are significant failures in landlords which we consider to be material to the landlord’s delivery of those outcomes, we hold them to account. Ultimately this provides protection for tenants’ homes and services and achieves better outcomes for current and future tenants. It also contributes to a sustainable sector which can attract strong investment.

We have a different role for regulating local authorities than for other landlords. This is because we have a narrower role for local authorities and the Governance and Financial Viability Standard, and Value for Money Standard do not apply. Further detail on which standards apply to different landlords can be found on our standards page.

We assess the performance of landlords through inspections and by reviewing data that landlords are required to submit to us. In Depth Assessments (IDAs) were one of our previous assessment processes, which are now replaced by our new inspections programme from 1 April 2024. We also respond where there is an issue or a potential issue that may be material to a landlord’s delivery of the outcomes of our standards. We publish regulatory judgements that describe our view of landlords’ performance with our standards. We also publish grades for landlords with more than 1,000 social housing homes.

The Housing Ombudsman deals with individual complaints. When individual complaints are referred to us, we investigate if we consider that the issue may be material to a landlord’s delivery of the outcomes of our standards.

For more information about our approach to regulation, please see Regulating the standards

Further information

• Regulating the standards

• Regulatory standards for landlords

• Decent Homes Standard