Delivering positive impact for our customers
Underlying our work is the acknowledgement that having a decent home to call your own, that’s safe and readily affordable, and gives you your own personal space and security, is one of the most important elements to enjoying a good quality of life. In the last 12 months, we’ve welcomed a range of government initiatives and reforms that should better support the delivery of new affordable homes in future. We actively contribute to national sector discussions and plans wherever we can. In the meantime, and with household numbers on council housing waiting lists standing at a 10-year high, we’ve played an ongoing strong role in driving the delivery of homes.
"With access to affordable housing continuing to hold societal growth back in the UK, especially in our region, one of the biggest impacts we can deliver is providing more people with their own home. For the third year, we’ve achieved our ambitious target of delivering more than 1,500 new homes. This means, 1,549 more local households now have the long-term security one of our homes provides. As a result, our development activity has created yet more positive impact for customers and our region."
- Sunita Aujla, Land and New Business Director
A key player addressing the supply challenge
As one of the biggest builders among housing associations in England, we’ve successfully completed 1,549 new homes in the last 12 months.
Completing a long-term regeneration scheme in Aldershot and delivering affordable family homes in Whiteley, plus much more, demonstrates the effectiveness of our development strategy and our strength. By buying land, working with partners and joint ventures, and continuing to purchase Section 106 homes, we have successfully delivered more new homes.
Looking to future schemes, we achieved the major milestone of breaking ground at our Victory Quay development in Portsmouth. We’re excited to deliver over 800 new homes together with community and green spaces, transforming Portsmouth's northern gateway into a new waterside community. Building on earlier community engagement, we’ve returned to local people this year, seeking views on what local services and facilities are missing locally; we are determined to accommodate as many of these as we can. This feedback is further informing our work around the introduction of retail and community spaces as part of the wider masterplan.
Behind every home built is a family, a future, and a community
Last year, we marked the completion of our 10,000th new home since VIVID was formed. It was an important moment to recognise the scale of delivery and the difference these homes make.
That home, at Stoneham Park in Eastleigh, became the start of a new chapter for Ashley Shields and her family, highlighting the real impact behind every home built.
Ashley said: “Moving into our new home has made a real difference to us. It’s somewhere we feel settled and able to look ahead with confidence.”
Out of the 10,000 new homes, over 80% are affordable tenures. These homes reflect a strong commitment to giving people across communities more choice, greater stability, and the security of a place they can truly call their own.
A few key developments
Of the many new developments underway this year, here are just a few we wanted to highlight:
Meeting housing needs in our region
Housing waiting lists across the region remain long and lengthy and, as in previous years, open market rents and purchase prices continue to pose real affordability problems for many people. The need for affordable homes of all types and tenures remains a leading challenge; this drives our focus on building the right homes where we know they’re needed most.
We’re proud of the number and mix of homes we’ve built this year. Of the 1,549 households now with a home to call their own, 92% were affordable tenures - 685 for social rent, 353 for affordable rent and 391 shared ownership homes.
A top 10 trusted and influential homes provider
Committed to sharing our expertise and using our influence to improve things for our customers and the wider sector, we’ve had another year featuring positive, front-foot engagement. Building and strengthening our working relationships with officials, elected representatives, industry groups and more, locally and nationally, has continued. As a result, our voice has been increasingly heard, enabling us to raise challenges and share thinking on a range of topics impacting existing and future customers. From participating in parliamentary committee round-tables, responding to government consultations and with our views being sought by sector bodies, we’ve continued to advocate hard on the issues that matter. It was particularly rewarding to see our calls for change around future delivery of energy efficiency improvements reflected in the government’s ‘Warm Homes Plan’ this year.
Local government reorganisation and devolution are nearly upon us and, over the last year, we’ve been closely monitoring these upcoming changes which will see larger local councils replace the many existing ones we currently work with. Devolution will bring, for the first time, elected mayors and strategic combined authorities within our operating area. Both these changes stand to create opportunities and risks for us. In particular, we’re hopeful that devolution will play a positive role in further helping address our region’s challenges around housing supply, planning, warm homes and skills. Collaborating with sector colleagues and wider third-party groups is ensuring we’re party to key discussions and involved in work that’s seeking to positively influence the future activity of incoming mayors and combined county authorities.
New homes at a glance 2025-26
contracts entered into for new homes
homes built for social and affordable rent and shared ownership
investment into developing new homes
of investment programme delivered through joint ventures or land-led
homes in the pipeline
new homes built
new sites secured
Bargate’s commitment to developing new homes responsibly, with a focus on design and with legacy in mind, continues to underpin its success. Its strength and capability to achieve planning permissions and build new homes while also ensuring it secures a strong future pipeline of development opportunities has once again been highlighted by its performance this year.
From gaining consent for 464 new homes across 6 sites, through to completing 229 new homes, Bargate has had another positive year. The business has moved forward planning applications for 5 more sites, creating the potential to secure the delivery of over 360 further homes in future. This work continues to contribute to our own overarching vision of more homes, bright futures.
In the same way as we’ve continued to improve the experience we provide to our customers, Bargate’s also been working hard to set the standard among housebuilders. For the second year running, Bargate has secured a five-star customer satisfaction rating in the Home Builders Federation’s annual survey, one of a limited group to have met the threshold needed. This highlights Bargate’s strong commitment to delivering a quality and positive experience for its customers.
