Get ready for our annual supported and older person’s housing survey

I'm pleased to announce our annual supported and older person’s housing survey is launching in January 2025. The survey will give us vital insights into the sector’s plans for developing and regenerating much-needed supported and older person’s homes. In the run up to the Spending Review, this data is crucial for our work calling for a long-term plan for housing that works for supported housing providers, and for the people in our society who need support to live independently.  
 
It is crucial we understand the key barriers our members face delivering these vital homes. By generating an accurate picture of these barriers, we can make an effective case for the funding that's needed. 
 
Ahead of the next survey, I want to explore what we found out last year and explain why this year’s survey is more important than ever. 

What did we find out last year? 

Our findings from surveying our members at the end of 2023 identified several key barriers to the development and regeneration of supported and older person’s housing, including:  

• Capital grants are too low.   
• A lack of available land.  
• Delays in planning applications.   
• A lack of commissioning certainty.  
• Funding for ongoing support is too low. 

Crucially, 61% of respondents told us that they would like to develop more homes if these barriers didn’t exist. This would have more than doubled respondents’ existing development plans, with a 112% increase in older persons’ housing delivery and a 102% increase in supported housing delivery.   

With the government now recognising that we need 180,000 new supported homes by 2040, the results show where vital funding is needed to unlock the development potential of supported and older person’s housing. Overall, the survey results highlighted that a challenging landscape for the sector is preventing investment in much-needed future homes.

What are we trying to find out this year?

The government recently published a Supported Housing Review, looking into the current and future demand for supported homes. The research acknowledges that there is little oversight of the real demand for supported housing, because of a lack of available data. Having surveyed our members annually since 2021, our survey is a key opportunity to compare the sector’s appetite for development year on year. To make a compelling case for policy change, we must understand more about how our sector is affected by the current financial and policy landscape.

Our findings will help us understand how supported housing providers are responding to meet demand for their services. It will allow us to explore the nuances and look at whether the future looks different for certain types of provision, such as different resident needs, the size or location of the provider. This will provide an important evidence base we can present to decision makers and inform our key asks of the government. 

Why is this year’s survey so important?

We know that this year the situation for supported and older person’s housing providers is particularly concerning. Our members are facing huge financial pressures due to decades of funding cuts and rising costs, alongside grappling with the effects of the National Insurance Contribution threshold changes, which will impact on the financial viability of current schemes, and on future plans to develop much-needed new homes.

Supported housing providers are seeing valuable services at risk of decommissioning entirely. With our research showing that as of June 2024, one in three supported housing providers have had to close services in the past year and 60% expect to close schemes in the future, this survey has never been more important.

At a time when the new government is committed to alleviating the pressure on the NHS and is set to undertake its first significant Spending Review, this survey provides an opportunity to articulate the risks and challenges facing the sector. Without sustainable support for maintaining and developing the supported housing we need, thousands will face homelessness or homes that do not meet their needs.

We must remember that without supported housing, 41,000 more people would be homeless, public services like the NHS would be under even more pressure and many more people would be living in homes that don’t meet their needs.

We’ll be emailing the survey to our supported and older person’s housing providers in January. If you have any questions about how the survey will work or would like to make sure your organisation will receive the survey, please get in touch.