Midlands welcome plan co-created by affordable housing tenants

Housing association Midland Heart has launched its new corporate plan to 2030, co-created by tenants.

Titled ‘Tenants at Heart’, the organisation claims this will be the most tenant-focused strategy it has ever delivered.

The 40-page plan details how Midland Heart plans to improve the quality of its c35,000 homes and deliver more responsive services for its c70,000 tenants.

Tenants at Heart is a collaboration between landlord and tenant.

Born out of thousands of conversations with tenants, including c14,000 completed tenant surveys, direct feedback from c1500 tenants and c650 face-to-face visits to tenants’ homes, the plan keenly articulates their point of view, culminating in an ambitious strategy that promises to deliver better service outcomes and meet the affordable housing needs of the region.

The cornerstone of Tenants at Heart is quality, underpinned by a £300million investment in their ‘homes fit for modern living’ programme, incorporating decent homes, retrofit and modernisation work over the next five years.

The organisation has some of the oldest homes of any housing association in the country, with over 10,000 properties over 100 years old.

Midland Heart’s latest strategy looks to tackle this head on, with a proactive programme of home upgrades and a preventative repairs service.

Chief executive of Midland Heart, Glenn Harris (pictured), said: “After spending the last few years simplifying our organisation and refocusing on our core social purpose as a landlord, I am confident that we have arrived at a place where we truly understand the priorities of our tenants and have the financial resilience and capacity to tackle them.

“Tenants at Heart is Midland Heart’s promise to put the tenant at the centre of our operations, our mindset, and our strategy over the next five years. We will empower our colleagues to make decisions on our tenants’ behalf, we will make record investments in our tenants’ homes, and we will build new homes so more people in our region have access to affordable housing.”

The plan teases the delivery of a net zero affordable housing community scheme of scale in the Midlands.

‘Project 100’ will be one of Midland Heart’s future flagship developments, an ambitious follow-up to the pioneering Project 80 development of homes completed in 2022, some of the first homes in the UK to meet the Future Homes Standard 2025.

The Midlands landlord also plans to deliver 2250 homes by 2030, which if successful will amount to a total of 6000 affordable homes delivered in the last decade.

Speaking of Midland Heart’s plan for the next five years, Parker added: “Midland Heart has been providing decent homes in our region for over 100 years.

“But there are still too many people in our region living in poor quality, temporary accommodation.

“The scale of that challenge means it has never been more important, or more urgent, that we build more homes for our residents.

“I’m already tackling the shortage in partnership with housing associations like Midland Heart.

“Since December, we have backed schemes that will deliver nearly 500 new social and affordable homes for those communities that need them most. But this is just the start.

“This investment in Midland Heart’s existing homes will make a significant improvement to the daily lives of thousands of families across our region – making their homes safer, warmer and cheaper to run.”