Community Led Housing

We have worked hard to understand the local need on the Peninsula, identify some possible sites for housing and get into contact with the main players – Cornwall Council, funders, housing groups and so on. All the work is described in our Community Housing report, which you can read here.

We have had really good support from the community and from all five Parish Councils. Cllr George Trubody has worked hard on our behalf and arranged meetings with the senior county leaders: the  Cornwall Council portfolio holder for Housing, Cllr Andrew Mitchell and the chief officer, Jon Lloyd-Owen.

 

Coastguard Cottages - Cawsand - The Story so far .......

The Peninsula Trust is working in partnership with Cornwall Council to see more homes for local people in the Rame Peninsula. We went to Cornwall Council with a proposition to buy and renovate three Council owned coastguard cottages in Cawsand village. The Council had been faced with a decision on whether it should renovate the cottages itself or sell them at auction.

Cornwall Council cabinet portfolio holder for homes Andrew Mitchell said: “The Council is committed to providing affordable homes for people with a local connection but has to have an eye on the best use of council taxpayers’ money. Renovating the cottages and renting them out ourselves was not necessarily going to be cost effective.”

The Trust put forward a proposal to buy the coastguard cottages from the Council, renovate them and then let them to local families at an affordable rent. An agreement was reached to buy the cottages and the Council is further assisting by helping to compile a bid for the renovation work to the Community Housing Fund; it is also providing advice and guidance to help the Trust get set up as a social landlord.

The Trust manager Simon Ryan takes up the story:  “House prices in our area are really high so it was likely that if these cottages were sold on the open market, they would have been beyond the reach of local people.  The Peninsula Trust saw an opportunity to buy them, then renovate and manage them locally by renting them out to local people.  

Cornwall Council has been brilliant and they’ve supported us from the start. We are working to secure the cottages and are going through the legal process, grinding away to get all the paperwork done. Whilst that goes on - and we are truly moving forward - we are setting up the details of the refurbishment work, the lettings arragnements and so on- but we’re well on the way!

The Cottages will be let in line with our formal allocations policy so when we have finalised the deal with Cornwall Council we will ask all interested parties to register on the Councils Homechoice website.  Thank you for your interest and we will keep you updated of our progress.