Investment trust insider on Home REIT – James Carthew: take shelter in a government-backed trust housing the homeless
Readers may already know I am a fan of Civitas Social Housing (CSH) and Triple Point Social Housing (SOHO) real estate investment trusts (I’m a shareholder in the former). Apart from the steady, government-backed income and attractive yields that those funds offer, they are helping to solve a real problem in the UK – a lack of specialist supported housing for people who need homes that are adapted to their needs.
Now, along comes another new Reit aiming to tackle another burning issue in the UK – homelessness.
Home Reit hopes to raise £250m to buy and fund the construction of a portfolio of homeless accommodation in the UK. It will let the property to specialist housing associations and registered charities on long-term leases (around 25 years). The rents will be linked to inflation.
The managers have experience in the sector, having launched a private fund in 2018 that has grown to be one of the largest social impact funds in Europe, with net assets of £430m.
Sadly, while other parts of the property market have been knocked sideways by Covid-19, the demand for homeless accommodation is increasing. Shelter, the homeless charity, reckons that there are 320,000 homeless people in the UK. This isn’t just about people sleeping rough – the visible signs of homelessness – there are many more in homeless shelters and temporary accommodation.
The causes of homelessness are many, complex and hard to tackle. They include drug and alcohol dependency; mental illness; people who find it difficult to cope when they leave an institutional environment, such as prison or the armed forces; children moving on from foster care; the breakdown of relationships; people escaping domestic violence; and eviction by private landlords.
Local authorities have a statutory duty to house individuals… read more here