Major affordable homes project hailed

A project which has involved more than 28 acres of unused land in Leicester being transformed into nearly 300 new-build affordable homes has been hailed by the city council.The homes have been created through rules which allow the transfer of land for a nominal fee of £1, in return for a housing association and developer building social accommodation on the site and giving the authority the right to nominate people from its register to live in the rented properties. The cost to build these homes is estimated at £102,000 per property, which means if Leicester City Council had built these homes itself, it would have cost the authority an estimated £29m.It comes after city mayor Sir Peter Soulsby signed a deal which will see up to 54 further new homes built on a former schools’ site in Eyres Monsell, with land also made available in another part of the city for a potential free school.