National statistics

Affordable housing supply in England: 2021 to 2022

Published 17 November 2022

Applies to England

1. Key statistics

59,175 affordable homes delivered (completions) in England in 2021-22, an increase of 13% compared to the previous year and similar to 2019-20 (less than 0.5% higher)

65% of new affordable housing completions were for rent (including social, affordable and intermediate rent), the same as the previous 2 years

44% of all affordable homes delivered in 2021-22 were funded through section 106 (nil grant) agreements, compared to 47% in the previous year and 51% in 2019-20

92% of affordable homes delivered in England were new build, compared to 89% in the previous year and similar to 2019-20

63,228 starts on site in England in 2021-22, an increase of 10% compared to the previous year

Release date: 17 November 2022

Lead Statistician: Miguel Marques dos Santos

Statistical queries: housing.statistics@levellingup.gov.uk

Media enquiries: 0303 444 1209 or NewsDesk@levellingup.gov.uk

2. Introduction

This release presents statistics on additional affordable housing supply in England. The estimates include new build and affordable housing providers’ acquisitions of private housing. Losses through demolitions, sales to tenants and other sales are not included so the statistics here show only new additions (or gross additions) to the affordable housing stock.

Additional affordable homes are defined as housing units (or bed spaces) provided to specified eligible households whose needs are not met by the market in addition to existing stock of affordable housing. Further details on the coverage of this release are given in the technical notes published alongside this release.

Homes England (previously the Homes and Communities Agency) is responsible for delivery of affordable housing in England, except London. They are responsible for increasing the number of new homes that are built in England, including affordable homes. The responsibility for affordable housing in London transferred to the Mayor of London from April 2012. This means that Homes England no longer administer or report on most affordable housing delivery in London, which is now the responsibility of the Greater London Authority.

Figures are presented for financial years ending 31 March and are presented unrounded, unless otherwise noted. They represent our best estimate at the time of publication and may be subject to revisions.

2.1 Affordable housing and social housing

Data on new supply are collected on the basis of new Affordable Housing. The definitions of Affordable and Social Housing overlap for the vast majority of properties, although there are a few differences. First Homes, an Affordable Housing tenure, does not count as Social Housing (tenure being the type of affordable housing). There are also some other instances where Social Housing and Affordable Housing differ, particularly in intermediate rent and affordable home ownership tenures, but is not possible to identify these instances in the underlying data.

Additionally, Affordable Housing owned by non-registered providers is not counted as Social Housing in the department’s statistical releases. The vast majority of social housing providers will be registered with the Regulator of Social Housing and only these providers can apply for grant funding to provide low cost rental accommodation, such as social rent and affordable rent.

Because the data on new supply are collected for Affordable Housing only, for statistical purposes, an estimate of new Social Housing can be considered a subset of new Affordable Housing provided by local authorities, private registered providers and where there is no provider information (provider unknown) for all tenures excluding First Homes, but including units where the tenure is unknown.

Sections I and J of the Local Authority Housing Statistics (LAHS) are released along with this publication.

Section I covers data on new supply of affordable housing, including delivery not reported by Homes England or the Greater London Authority, delivery in populations of less than 3,000 and financial information regarding section 106 contributions.

Section J cover starts-on-site not reported by Homes England or the Greater London Authority.

3. National trends in affordable housing supply

There were 59,175 affordable homes delivered in England in 2020-21, an increase of 13% compared with the previous year and the highest number of completions since 2014-15, which was the end of the 2011-15 Affordable Homes Programme. These programmes provide government grant funding to housing providers in England to support the costs of delivering affordable homes. They are the government’s main programme of investment in affordable housing and they are delivered by Homes England and the Greater London Authority.

These new 59,175 homes represent the new additions to the affordable housing stock in 2021-22.

Chart 1: Affordable housing completions by tenure, England, 1991-92 to 2021-22

The data for this chart are available in Live Table 1000.

The number of affordable homes delivered has varied considerably since 2011-12. The supply of affordable housing is dependent on funding programmes, and as part of a house building cycle, delivery is normally lower in the first years of any new programme. The peak in 2014-15 is explained by the end of the 2011-15 Affordable Homes Programme and the increase in the number of completions since 2015-16 reflects the transition to the 2016-23 Affordable Homes Programme.

Unlike during the 2011-15 programme, every year between 2015-16 and 2019-20 saw an increase in the delivery of affordable homes. The decrease in 2020-21 may be due, in large part, to the restrictions introduced during spring 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The number of completions in 2021-22 is similar to completions in 2019-20, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

3.1 Delivery of new affordable housing by tenure

There have been changes in the mix of different tenures of affordable housing. Up to 2011-12, social rent was the most common affordable housing tenure for new supply, but affordable rent has become the most common since its introduction in 2011-12. This change was driven in part by the 2011-15 Affordable Homes Programme, as well as subsequent affordable homes programmes, which funded affordable rent as a tenure. Recent programmes also fund shared ownership, which contributed to an increase in these properties, from 4,084 in 2015-16 to 19,386 in the latest year.

In 2021-22, there were 38,668 new affordable homes for rent ^{[footnote 1]}, higher than the 34,001 in the previous year and similar to 2019-20. The share of new affordable homes that are for rent was 65%, similar to the previous 3 years but lower than between 2013-14 to 2017-18 when it varied between 74% and 78%.

3.2 Delivery of new affordable housing by provider

In 2021-22, 81% of all affordable homes were delivered by private registered providers, with local authorities delivering 13% and non-registered providers 3% ^{[footnote 2]} . There is no provider information on the remaining 3% of all units. These proportions are similar to the previous 5 years.

Chart 2: Percentage of affordable housing completions by provider, England, 1991-92 to 2021-22

The data for this chart are available in the Affordable Housing open data file.

Historically, private registered providers had a higher share of the delivery (nearly all affordable housing delivery throughout the 1990s was through private registered providers). The 7,796 affordable homes delivered by local authorities (representing 13% of the overall affordable housing delivery, as per above) are the highest recorded number of local authority completions since 1991-92; however, this comparison should be interpreted with care because the number of units for which is not possible to identify the provider was higher prior to 2014-15 than it is currently ^{[footnote 3]}.

3.3 Funding of new affordable housing completions

Delivery of affordable homes funded through s106 nil grant agreements ^{[footnote 4] [footnote 5]} accounted for 44% of all affordable homes delivered in 2021-22. This represents a year-on-year decrease since 2019-20, when it was 51%. In part, this may be due to the impact of to the restrictions introduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The first completions of s106 (nil grant) were recorded in 2000-01 and nearly all homes funded through this process are new build properties. Prior to 2014-15, s106 (partial grant) units were not separately identified in the data and are captured within the numbers of grant funded units. Partial grant funding used to be much more prevalent but recently the vast majority of s106 funded units are nil grant.

Chart 3: Affordable housing completions by funding, England, 1991-92 to 2021-22

The data for this chart are available in Live Table 1000C.

4. Regional delivery of new affordable housing

In 2021-22, London was the region with the highest delivery of new affordable housing, followed by the South East. While this is consistent with historical data, between 2017-18 and 2019-20 delivery was higher in the South East. Together, these 2 regions underlie the trends in affordable housing completions. A full set of regional figures are included in Live Table 1008C.

Chart 4: Affordable housing completions by region, England, 1991-92 to 2021-22

The data for this chart are available in Live Table 1008C.

Trends by tenure present a more complex picture. On social rent, more than half (57%) of new social rent homes in 2021-22 were in just 3 regions - South East, West Midlands and South West. Until 2017-18, most delivery of new social rent was in London and the South East. On affordable rent, both the South East and the East of England have delivered more homes than London since 2016-17 and 2017-18, respectively. In 2016-17, 2017-18 and this year, there were more affordable rent homes delivered in the North West than in London. Both of these changes coincided with the Greater London Authority’s introduction of London affordable rent as a tenure in 2017-18. In 2021-22, the Greater London Authority delivered 3,080 in this tenure.

Figures for regional and local authority completions of homes by tenure can be found in Live Tables 1006C to 1007cC.

In 2021-22, 39% of local authority delivery was done by London boroughs (including the City of London), similar to 2013-14 and 2014-15 but higher than the years in between (32% in 2020-21, 34% in 2019-20 and around a quarter between 2015-16 and 2018-19).

19% of delivery by non-registered providers was in the South East, compared to 21% in the previous year. Regional trends for private registered provider delivery more closely reflect overall delivery.

5. Delivery of affordable housing in rural-urban areas

Using DEFRA’s 2011 rural-urban classification for England, it is possible to present sub-national trends in rural and urban areas ^{[footnote 6]}.

In 2021-22, 26,105 units were delivered in local authorities classified as rural ^{[footnote 7]} and 32,997 in those classified as urban ^{[footnote 8]}. This is higher than 2020-21 and similar to 2019-20, prior to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, compared to 2020-21 the increase in rural areas was higher than in urban areas (19% compared to 10%), possibly in large part due to the decrease in delivery between 2019-20 and 2020-21 being higher in rural areas than urban areas (16% decrease in rural areas compared to 8% in urban). This was likely due to the restrictions introduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Chart 5: Affordable housing completions by 2011 rural-urban classification, England, 1991-92 to 2021-22

In 2021-22, rural local authorities represented 44% of all completions, slightly higher than the 42% in 2020-21. The proportion of completions in rural local authorities was historically around 30% of all completions, but it increased steadily from 2011-12 and since 2016-17 has varied between 42% and 45%.

5.1 Affordable housing delivery in populations less than 3,000

The Local Authority Housing Statistics ^{[footnote 9]} also collects the number of new build and acquisitions in populations of less than 3,000.

In 2021-22, there were 4,556 new affordable homes in these areas, which accounted for 8% of all new affordable housing, which has been decreasing since a peak of 5,702 in 2018-19, which represented 10% of all new affordable housing delivery.

6. New build homes and acquisitions

There were 53,487 new build affordable homes completed in 2021-22, the highest number since 2014-15. These were supplemented by 4,605 acquisitions of existing stock and 1,083 homes where there is currently no information on whether they are new build or acquisitions.

The 53,487 new build affordable homes represent an increase of 0.2% on the existing stock of all 24.87m homes in England at 31 March 2021 ^{[footnote 10]}. This is the same as in recent years, with the proportion varying between 0.1% and 0.4% throughout the available period (since 1991-92).

Proportionally, of the 59,175 affordable homes delivered in 2021-22, 92% were new build and 8% were acquisitions (excluding unknowns). These proportions have changed considerably since the early 1990s, particularly after 2003-04. In 1992-93, 6 out of 10 new affordable homes were new build compared to 9 out of 10 in the latest year. The remaining homes were acquisitions.

Chart 6: Percentage of affordable housing completions by new build and acquisitions, England, 1991-92 to 2021-22

Note: The chart excludes completed affordable units where build type was unknown.

The data for this graph are available in Live Table 1009.

7. Starts on site

Since 2015-16, the department has published live tables with starts on site ^{[footnote 11]} of affordable housing to provide a leading indicator of affordable supply. However, starts funded directly by local authorities or by planning agreements only started being collected in 2016-17 and are collected on a voluntary basis. This means 2015-16 data does not include these data and and subsequent years may still be under reporting it.

In 2021-22, First Homes ^{[footnote 12]} were introduced as a tenure and are reported either via Homes England or local authorities (through the Local Authority Housing Statistics data return). However, Homes England cannot provide information on starts of First Homes. Therefore, First Homes starts are undercounted in this release and accompanying tables.

There were 63,228 starts on site in England in 2021-22, compared to 57,693 in the previous year, a 10% increase.

Chart 7: Affordable housing starts on site by tenure, England, 2016-17 to 2021-22

The data for this chart are available in Live Table 1000S.

Affordable rent and shared ownership continue to account for the largest number of starts where the tenure is known, although the number of starts known to be for affordable rent decreased compared to the previous year. In 2021-22, these 2 tenures accounted for 44% of new affordable housing starts compared to 58% in the previous year and 70% in 2019-20. In part, this is due to the increase in the number of starts for which tenure was unknown since 2019-20 following the introduction of units delivered via Strategic Partnerships ^{[footnote 13]}. These units will have their tenure confirmed at a later stage.

The number of social rent and London affordable rent units started in 2021-22 increased by 2% and 50% respectively, compared to 2020-21 and in both instances are the highest for the 6 year period for which there is comparable data.

In 2021-22, the overall number of affordable starts for rent (31,364) decreased 8% compared to the previous year, while those for ownership increased by 4%. Affordable housing starts for rent represented half of all starts in 2021-22, lower than the 59% in the previous year. These percentages are likely to be impacted by the 86% increase in units where the tenure is yet unknown (See above).

8. Tables and open data

See the live tables accompanying this release.

See the open data accompanying this release.

9. Technical notes

Please see the accompanying technical notes for further details.

10. Changes to this release

There are no major changes to this release, but the commentary on affordable housing and overall housing gross supply will be included in the Housing supply: net additional dwellings statistical release that will be published on 24 November 2022.

11. Next release

The date of the next release is pre-announced on GOV.UK.

1. Affordable homes for rent includes the following tenures: social rent, London affordable rent, affordable rent and intermediate rent. ↩

2. In 2018-19, Homes England started funding delivery of shared ownership homes provided by non-registered providers. Non-registered providers cannot receive Homes England funding for other tenures. However, a small proportion of social rent (34 starts and 16 completions) and affordable rent units (156 starts and 428 completions) funded by Homes England in 2020-21 had as lead organisation a non-registered provider, which at later date will be handed over to either a local authority or a private registered provider. These units have been classified as “unknown” provider and with “other” funding in Live Tables 1000S, 1000C, 1011S and 1011C. The department is working with Homes England to better understand how to present these data in future. ↩

3. For this release, there was a revision to the provider information. Due to a processing error in the 2020-21 data release, a number of social rent, London affordable rent and affordable rent units by non-registered providers were assigned to local authorities for the period between 2014-15 and 2020-21. Other tenures were not affected. The count of private registered providers, unknown provider and overall total are also not affected. ↩

4. Please see the Housing statistics and English Housing Survey glossary for a definition. ↩

5. Since 2017-18, details of s106 units for London reported by the Greater London Authority (GLA) are estimates based on the total number of nil grant homes recorded on projects within the GLAOps. ↩

6. The local authorities created on 1 April 2019, 1 April 2020 and 1 April 2021 were classified based on the data available through the link in the previous footnote: Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole was classified as Urban with City and Town, while Dorset, West Suffolk, Somerset West and Taunton and East Suffolk were classified as Largely Rural (rural including hub towns 50-79%) and Buckinghamshire, North Northamptonshire and West Northamptonshire were classified as Urban with Significant Rural (rural including hub towns 26-49%). ↩

7. For the purpose of this bulletin, “rural” includes the following 3 categories: Mainly Rural (rural including hub towns >=80%), Largely Rural (rural including hub towns 50-79%) and Urban with Significant Rural (rural including hub towns 26-49%). ↩

8. For the purpose of this bulletin, “urban” includes the following 3 categories: Urban with City and Town, Urban with Minor Conurbation and Urban with Major Conurbation. ↩

9. Variables i1a (new build) and i6a (acquisitions) in Section I of the data return. ↩

10. DLUHC Live Table 104. ↩

11. It should be noted that starts on site are not planning applications. For further details, please see definition in the Housing statistics and English Housing Survey glossary. ↩

12. Homes England started recording First Homes completions in 2021-22. However, these are reported as market units in the accompanying tables to their release, but are counted as affordable housing in this release. These units are part of a small phase 1 pilot being delivered by the Single Land Programme, the starts on site for which are also reported as market units. A phase 2 grant funded pilot is delivering 1,500 First Homes units via the First Homes Early Delivery Programme 2021-23. Both pilots are in advance of the delivery of First Homes via Planning Policy. Homes England cannot separately identify starts on site that are First Homes. ↩

13. Strategic partnerships were introduced in 2018 and work as long-term agreements between one or more housing associations and Homes England. Homes England’s funding of these units is based on a whole development programme rather than scheme-by-scheme. ↩