Insights
Supporting Scotland's Growth
Location as a Barrier to Housing Delivery in the Central Belt?
Research unveiled by Lichfields, examines the reasons behind the under-delivery of new housing in Scotland.
Lichfields is pleased to launch the second in our series of ‘Supporting Scotland’s Growth’ research reports. In this research Lichfields has produced a Market Strength Index (MSI) – a composite index of housing demand and market strength – which, brought together with future housing supply (land allocations) highlights problems ahead for housing delivery, and suggests that OVER one-third of earmarked housing sites in Scotland’s central belt have little chance of being developed contributing to the major shortfall in Scottish housebuilding.
The analysis in this report suggests one reason may be that the wrong land is being allocated in the wrong places: in the aftermath of a housing market recession, with housing transactions and values well below their 2007/8 rate, the allocation of large numbers of sites in weaker market areas is likely to undermine the ability to increase delivery rates in the short term.
Nicola Woodward, Head of Edinburgh Office