Name and business title: Bev Hall, Sales and Marketing Director, Bromford Homes.
Where is your firm offering new homes? We have shared ownership developments across central England - from Staffordshire in the north to Gloucestershire in the south, Shropshire in the west to Northamptonshire in the east. This year will see the launch of 19 new developments and more than half of them are already under way. It's all go!
What types of shared ownership properties does Bromford provide? Everything from small cosy apartments to spacious three-bed family houses.
What is the minimum percentage the buyer can acquire and how much does it cost? The minimum is 25% and the actual amount - between 25% and 75% - is determined by a formula that works out how much a buyer can afford to pay when taking savings, regular outgoings and any debts into account.
The average is around 45% - and for something like a three-bed house at Castle View, Doxey, just outside Stafford, that works out at £63,000 compared to a full market price of £140,000.
As a shared ownership buyer, they will need to take out a mortgage to pay for their share of the home's purchase price and pay rent on the remaining share. We work closely with the customers to make sure that their shared ownership deal is truly affordable.
How much do you need to earn and what savings do you need in order to qualify for one of your shared ownership schemes? Well, the first thing to say is that shared ownership isn't just for key workers or people on the housing waiting list - as many people believe.
You can buy a home through shared ownership if you cannot afford to buy a home outright, you're a first-time buyer or used to own a home but can't afford to buy one now, or if you rent a housing association or council home. In fact, your joint household income can be as much as £60,000 but obviously the higher your disposable income the higher the share you'll be asked to buy.
As for savings, these are taken into account as part of the affordability formula that determines the percentage that someone is expected to buy. If you mean saving for a deposit, we say that shared ownership makes a tremendous difference to first-time buyers because they have much less to find than if they were trying to buy through outright sale.
Shared ownership means local first-time buyers can realise their home ownership dream at a price they can afford and much sooner than the ten years or so that many believe they otherwise face.
Affordability is a key issue for so many first-time buyers and, with many lenders requiring fairly large deposits, shared ownership really is a great way for people to get into the home-buying market. If you look at our new Larks Rise development in Coventry, you can get on the housing ladder here for as little as £30,625, with deposits starting from £1,532 for a two-bed house, or £36,875 for a three-bed house, with a deposit of as low as £1,850. Compare that with the tens of thousands that most lenders require in deposit from many first-time buyers - and remember that not everyone can dip into the Bank of Mum and Dad.
In light of on-going stringent mortgage lending conditions, how important is shared ownership in helping buyers gain a foot on the housing ladder? We believe that shared ownership is one of the property world's best-kept secrets. We need to do more, much more, to ensure that aspiring home-owners and even people in the property sector understand what it is, how it works and what it can do for many hard-pressed working people.
HomeBuy offers aspiring homeowners the chance to buy between 25% and 75% of their home and pay subsidised rent on the remaining share. Buyers can increase that share through a process known as staircasing and even buy their home outright when - and if - their finances allow.
Buyers can, in most cases, go on to buy 100% of their property and although only one in five shared ownership buyers since 2001 have done so, we have two things to say on this. Firstly, let's not forget that some customers are really happy with their tenure, don't want to staircase to 100% and there is no pressure for them to do so. What they've got is affordable, it's secure, it gives them what is arguably the best of both worlds.
Secondly, we're seeing a change in the demographic of our shared ownership buyers. More of those buyers are people who, before the credit crunch, would probably have been able to buy outright. Now, with the housing shortage and consumer credit squeeze, that is no longer possible - unless, of course, they can make a withdrawal from the Bank of Mum and Dad.
These are typically young working people who can afford the 5-10% deposit for a 25% or 50% share in one of our shared ownership homes. People are more likely to progress in their careers, to increase their earnings and to staircase their share up to the 75% maximum and even to buy outright.
This is a definite trend and we'll be really interested to see the results of more research studies in a few years time. We would expect to see a rise in the number of people staircasing up to 75% or even full ownership.
In the meantime, yes, we do need to make HomeBuy work better - most of all, we need to raise awareness and to find a more effective way of marketing shared ownership because most first-time buyers don't know about it - rather than design a new alternative, as has been suggested by some critics.
What makes a shared owners property by Bromford stand out from the crowd? The quality of all we do - and the the care we put into everything from our first conversation with a customer to the moment we hand over the keys, and beyond.
What kind of buyer has been coming to you for shared ownership recently? We're still getting a steady flow of "typical buyers" - people who for one reason or another want to enjoy the benefits of home ownership but can't afford to buy a home outright and possibly never will.
More recently, of course, we've been helping buyers who fall into what's now become known as Generation Rent. It's a problem that was highlighted by a recent ITV Tonight programme - people who earn good money and would normally be able to buy their own home but are now asked to come up with tens of thousands in deposit to get a mortgage. They believe they have no other option than to rent on the private market and pay as much if not more than they would in mortgage payments. That means they are unable to save enough to build up a hefty deposit and, in some cases, believe that it could take them as long as ten years to save enough.
People still want to own their own homes - and shared ownership makes that dream possible in a way that people can truly afford. In fact, buying your home can cost less then you might pay in rent. It's not, of course, all about the money. Many of our shared ownership buyers tells us the security that comes with owning your own home is really important to them.
This is especially true for families with children in local schools and who want to put down roots. Renting can make sense for some people but others tell us that having to move twice, three times on two months notice is upsetting and can make huge upheaval for families - especially those with children - and, of course, it could happen again and again.
What is Bromford's USP? Our USP is about making home ownership really accessible rather than features such as the latest modcons or state-of-the-art energy-efficiency. As part of our Homebuy shared ownership offer we make sure that every home we sell is truly affordable - and the homes we sell are built to a high quality, they're energy efficient and easy to run with all the features that modern buyers now expect. We also understand that buying a home is more than a financial decision. That's why when you buy a Bromford home you're getting a property you can be proud of - built to the best possible standards - and somewhere you will want to stay. You're buying into a way of life.
That's why our dedicated teams are there for you before you buy, when you buy - and after you buy. We won't walk away and leave you the day after you move in.
Which of Bromford's current developments do you think stands the best chance of winning a What House? Award? Such a hard decision! The Farthings in Telford is definitely one of our stand-out developments because, from a Bromford point of view, it's pretty much got the lot. It's a great-looking development - well designed and built to the highest standard with many eco-friendly features such as solar panelling and heat recovery systems by our sector-leading in-house construction team, Bromford Developments Ltd. And I'm pleased to say that the shared ownership homes have been snapped up by local first-time buyers, who've given us some really great positive feedback (case study available).
It's hard to believe that a few years ago this was an local eyesore, a patch of derelict land at Ketley on the edge of Telford. The transformation since then has been truly amazing.
Our colleagues in the Bromford development team are rightly proud of it and their feeling is shared by local councillors, who agree with us that this has been a model example of partnership working. It's certainly true from a Bromford perspective. As well as Bromford Homes, this project has involved virtually every arm of the wider Bromford business, with rented homes managed by Bromford Living and a support scheme for adults with learning difficulties, run by Bromford Support. A real team effort!