Plans have been submitted for a housing scheme that would see a former care home converted into apartments to help meet demand for affordable homes in a North Yorkshire market town.
Brierley Homes, our housing development company, has joined forces with Broadacres Housing Association in drawing up the plans for Brentwood Lodge, a former local authority facility in Leyburn.
If given the go-ahead, the scheme will see the current buildings transformed into 24 affordable apartments, consisting of 13 one-bed and 11 two-bed properties at the location on Quarry Hills Lane.
The apartments will be built to meet the Government’s Future Homes Standard (FHS), which aims to make new homes constructed from 2025 more energy efficient and have lower carbon emissions.
Once completed, Broadacres, a not-for-profit housing association managing over 6,000 homes across North Yorkshire, will take over the site and rent the apartments to people within the local area. Applicants will need to be registered with North Yorkshire Home Choice, a housing allocations scheme, letting available local authority and housing association properties for rent across the county.
Brierley Homes’ managing director, Stuart Ede, said: “Getting a foot on the housing ladder can be difficult, if not impossible, for some people.
“Schemes like the one we are developing with Broadacres Housing Association are one way of creating homes people can afford. This scheme offers housing that is future-proofed and fit for modern living, offering people in the local area a high-quality home.”
Broadacres’ director of development and investment, Helen Fielding, said: “We are pleased to be once again working with Brierley Homes to bring more, much-needed affordable homes to this part of rural North Yorkshire.
“The homes will be made available to local people, with the aim of ensuring that rural communities like Leyburn continue to remain sustainable for those who live and work in this beautiful market town.”
In 2022, the North Yorkshire Rural Commission, the first of its kind to be launched nationally to tackle a range of long-standing issues affecting countryside communities, reported that the affordable homes crisis in North Yorkshire was particularly accentuated in the county’s rural areas.
At the time, it found that average house prices in the Yorkshire Dales were about a third higher than the county’s average, with the average cost of a property nearly £400,000 while the weekly wage in North Yorkshire was just over £530.
Our executive member for housing, Cllr Simon Myers, said the proposed scheme was a great example of the council working successfully with partners to help address this issue.
“The need for affordable housing is not just an issue for us in North Yorkshire, it is a national problem,” he said. “As a council, we have a duty to our residents to enable the right homes to be created in the right places and schemes like this one will certainly help those looking to find somewhere to live in Leyburn.”
A public consultation on the scheme was held earlier this year, with the plans positively received. Leyburn Town Council has also been supportive, along with our member for Leyburn and Middleham, Cllr Karin Sedgwick, who said she hoped the scheme could become a blueprint for similar initiatives across the county.
She said: “There is a shortage of suitable housing in Leyburn and the surrounding villages, so this is most welcome.
“It would be good to be able to provide affordable housing for young people, but there has been a lot of interest shown by others wanting to downsize. This would have the effect of putting family homes on the market so would also be welcome.”
If councillors back the scheme, it is expected it would be completed by the winter of 2025.