Australia’s first whole suburb social housing funding initiative

Australia’s first whole suburb social housing funding initiative

Australia’s first whole suburb social housing funding initiative

26 August 2015

Australia’s first whole suburb social housing funding initiative

Capital Estate Developments today announced it had partnered with Homes for Homes (H4H) in a new social housing initiative focused on reducing homelessness in the ACT.

H4H is an independent, not-for-profit organisation established by Australia’s largest and most successful social enterprise, The Big Issue. The H4H initiative for the homeless is funded by donations of 0.1% of the initial and subsequent sales price of individual blocks or houses. This donation must be spent in the community area in which it was raised on social and affordable housing.

Capital Estates Managing Director Stephen Byron said Denman Prospect would be the first entire suburb in Australia to commit to the H4H initiative.

“Our commitment is that we will donate 0.1% of the sale proceeds of all land we sell at Denman to H4H for homeless projects in the ACT.

“We will ensure that all builders’ sales are required to have a caveat on their title, and they must not remove it, meaning there will be a follow up donation of 0.1% of all builders’ sales.

“Further, for all sales direct to home owners, we will insert the H4H clause and thus they will take the property with the H4H permissible caveat in place. This means that whilst they have the right to remove the caveat at any time under the normal H4H regime, the whole suburb of Denman will have the prima facie starting point of committing to the social outcome of contributing to reducing homelessness.”

Denman Prospect will have around 2000 dwellings. The first land sales will occur in the next two months.

“The Snow Foundation has a long history of working to reduce homelessness, most recently with the Common Ground ACT project,” Mr Byron said.

“Separately, I have committed my own home to H4H and I encourage all property owners in Canberra to do the same.

“This is a simple way of generating recurring funding that will help stamp out homelessness in our own region.”

Media inquiries:          Capital Estates Jane Seaborn 0414 829 282