2022 was a year of turmoil for sure but also a year in which housing in the UK was being highlighted for all the wrong reasons. We had to suffer the terrible news of young Awaab Ishak’s death due to poor housing conditions. This could be the start of the next big scandal unfolding after Grenfell. Put simply: Houses cost lives and that’s a fact; a fact not lost upon the team doing a wonderful job at Coastline Housing in Cornwall who have a fantastic project monitoring both building health and more notably, the health and wellbeing of the residents who live in them!

At HLPS we have not only designed a rent to ownership model to match PRS investment with residents (who cannot get on the housing ladder and yet rent successfully year after year) but we have worked on maximising energy efficiency. We have worked with Impact Lab to develop an energy consumption and prediction solution to support residents pockets and we have specified a sensor set to monitor air quality in order to assist the protection of both building fabric and the health and wellbeing of the residents. Inspired by Mark England and his team at Coastline!

So at HLPS we want to attack the housing crisis, financial inclusivity issues and ensure residents wealth is not impacted by their health due to poor quality housing which not only hits families’ pockets but has a huge cost and resource impact on the NHS.

So let’s get the £ millions needed to provide homes at scale and build better, healthier housing and stand up and be counted for social and environmental impact. It’s a golden opportunity!

Richard George – CEO HLPS