Peabody's development falls by two-thirds as it focuses on committed pipeline

Peabody’s new home completions are down 66% year-on-year.

The 109,000-home housing association, in a trading update today, said it completed 225 homes in the six months to 30 September, compared to 654 the previous year.

The figures illustrate the extent of the association’s scaling back of new build. It follows a previous 40% drop in annual development from 2,399 homes in 2022/23 to 1,381 in 2023/24.

It said: “We invested £244m in our new homes programme over the last six months, completing 225 new homes.

“Our starts on site this year will be substantially lower than in previous years as we prioritise our already committed pipeline. We currently have around 5,400 homes onsite under construction.”

Peabody spent £93m on repairs and maintenance in the half-year, up from £84m the previous year and £97m on improvements to residents’ homes, similar to last year’s figure of £100m.

The group is planning to invest £2bn on existing stock over five years.

Today’s update also showed Peabody’s half-year surplus has fallen from £41m to £34m year-on-year. Its surplus on staircasing and disposal of fixed assets fell by £9m.

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Its overall turnover remained fairly flat at £486m compared to £489m in the same period last year. A £45m increase in revenue from core social housing operations was offset by a £48m drop in sales income.

It said: “While the completion of sales is progressing at a slower rate than hoped we expect to see a gradual improvement in the second half of the current financial year and into the next.”

Peabody, which is moving towards a more localised ‘neighbourhood’ model of housing management said it has “made good progress” simplifying its operations and governance structures and is looking to raise capital by selling ‘non-core’ assets.

The group said it has seen an improvement of 1% across a range of areas in the results of its Tenant Satisfaction Measures in the half-year compared to the full year 2023/24 results.