Pioneering community-led housing development completed in Lewisham
11 genuinely and permanently affordable homes for local residents have been completed at Citizens House - a new, pioneering, community-led housing development in Sydenham. The homes have been delivered by London Community Trust, in partnership with Lewisham Citizens, Lewisham Council and the Greater London Authority.
All 11 homes are genuinely affordable, with prices linked to average incomes in Lewisham. If residents move out, they must resell their homes at prices linked to local incomes, meaning they will be permanently affordable for generations to come.
Citizens House is already home to nine families, with the final two families in the process of moving in. To be eligible for one of the homes, residents had to have a strong five-year connection to the borough, demonstrate a serious housing need, show their involvement in their local community and have sufficient income and savings to get a mortgage.
The homes have being delivered by London Community Land Trust, who work with local residents and organisations across the city to deliver homes and community spaces. Community land trusts (CLTs) are set up and run by ordinary people to design, develop and manage homes and other assets for local communities, acting as long-term stewards of land.
This project started as a campaign by local people through Lewisham Citizens to address the lack of affordable housing in the borough. Since then, nearly 500 Lewisham residents have become members of London CLT and local people have led the entire project, selecting the architects and builders and working collaboratively to make key decisions about the design, planning and management of the development.
The land for the project, previously an underused garage site, was provided by Lewisham Council and the development forms part of our Building for Lewisham programme, which is delivering new social and affordable housing across the borough for local residents to help tackle the housing crisis.
Damien Egan, Mayor of Lewisham, said: “Citizens House in Sydenham is Lewisham’s first completed community land trust development. 11 new homes have been built, all of them at permanently affordable rates. It’s a great project and I’m pleased the Council were able to release land to work with London CLT, Lewisham Citizens and the GLA to make it a reality.”
Find out more about Citizens House and London Community Land Trust.