Former Places for People boss David Cowans joins private equity group Regis

Affordable housing development pioneer David Cowans has been hired by real estate private equity investors Regis Group as an advisor.

The former chief executive of Places for People will join Regis, which has previously acquired £8bn of affordable housing assets in the US, to help develop new affordable housing initiatives.

Regis Group, which has headquarters in Mayfair and offices in New York and Dallas in the US, builds and manages “ESG-oriented” real estate investment platforms backed by institutional capital. It previously set up for-profit housing association Sage Housing with investment giant Blackstone.

Cowans has been one of the most influential figures in the affordable housing sector over the past two decades.

In his 24-year tenure as chief executive before standing down last year, he built Places for People into a giant housing association with more than 219,000 homes under management and more than £800m turnover.

Cowans said: “The challenges to increasing housing supply are evident everywhere and I am delighted to be advising the team to identify new ways to channel investment into housing and to deliver much needed new solutions to increase supply, drive up customer standards and provide greater choice.”

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Nick Gould, founder and executive chair at Regis, said: “David has a record of delivering commercially with substantial social impact and challenging the status quo. This experience reflects our own track record of value creation in non-traditional real estate asset classes.”

Under Cowans’ watch, Places for People became a major developer of housing. Last year it completed 2,186 new homes. In December 2020 it agreed a partnership with Countryside to build 1,000 homes over a decade and it has been allocated £250m to build 4,403 homes under a Homes England strategic partnership.

Places for People has pioneered the development of different tenures of housing, giving residents and buyers different options, as well as prioritising placemaking and innovation in construction methods, working with firms such as Urban Splash, Igloo and modular housebuilder Ilke. It has also diversified into other areas, most notably leisure, through its portfolio of more than 100 facilities.

Places for People hired former US banker Greg Reed as its new chief executive, following Cowans’ decision to stand down.