Last updated 30 September 2022
Riverside
Riverside started in 1928 as Liverpool Improved Houses and by 1996 had 19,000 homes and was re-named as Riverside. In 1998, the group merged with Leicester Family Housing Association and in 2006 with English Churches Housing Group
In December 2021, Riverside formed a partnership with One Housing, which owns or manages more than 17,000 units in nearly 50 local authorities across London and the surrounding Home Counties and has subsidiaries include Island Homes Housing Association, Citistyle Living, Community Action, TPHA and CHA Ventures.
The enlarged group will be fully merged by December 2023, owns around 75,000 homes, have 5,000 employees and have a combined turnover in the region of £500 million.
Financials
In the 12 months to March 2021, group revenue at Riverside fell back to £346.2 million (2021: £364.3 million) but the operating surplus surged to £95.4 million (2021: £79.5 million) and the group returned a surplus before tax of £60.1 million (2021: £26.9 million loss).
To view the financials for Riverside, visit the group”s website here.
In the 12 months to March 2021, group revenue at One Housing edged up to £178.8 million (2021: £175.8 million) but the operating surplus surged to £37.3 million (2021: £5.1 million) and the group returned a surplus before tax of £28.8 million after losing money at this level in the previous year (2021: £15.8 million loss).
To view the financials for One Housing, visit the group”s website here.
Operations
Riverside works on new housing schemes with local authorities such as Cheshire West & Chester Council, private developers include Vistry and also has its own development operation, Prospect (GB).
Major developments include the £38 million Calverley Close Estate Residential Development in Bromley, south London, which is due to produce 275 new homes (Project ID: 18304817), and the Woodlands development for 244 houses and 24 flats at Winsford in Cheshire (Project ID: 20130437).
One Housing works in joint venture with local authorities such as the London boroughs of Enfield, Lewisham and Newham, and with private sector developers such as Batavia and Argent. The group is involved with the £600 million Hallsville Quarter scheme, which is a major mixed-use regeneration project at Canning Town in east London led by the London Borough of Newham and involving Bouygues subsidiary Linkcity (Project ID: 09214101).
One Housing also has a number of other major projects in the development pipeline in London, ranging from the £87 million Montmorency Park mixed development in Engield, orth London, to include 517 new homes (Project ID: 10031853).
In the 2022 annual survey by Inside Housing magazine, One Housing did not appear but Riverside was ranked in equal ninth position after completing on 1,121 units, which include 32 homes for social rent and 631 for affordable rent. Riverside was ranked seventh in terms of starts after beginning work on 1,393 units.
Riverside expected to complete 1,112 homes in 2022/23 and had secured sites for 923 of these homes. In the next two years, Riverside expects to complete 2,633 homes with plots secured for 1,450 of these units. Over the next five years, Riverside expects to complete 6,240 homes and had secured sites for 3,629 of these homes.
Out of the 1,121 homes that Riverside completed in 2021/22, 233 were for market sale and produced a surplus of £14.5 million. Riverside was ranked seventh in terms of homes built for market sale.
Glenigan Data
In Glenigan’s ranking of RSLs by planning activity for 2021, Riverside applied to build 178 units (2020: 0 units) and One Housing sent in detailed planning applications to build a total of 544 units (2020: 1,481 units).
In the 12 months to Q2 2022, One Housing awarded £16.75 million-worth of work construction contracts (2021: £22.2 million), while Riverside awarded work totalling £1.8 million (2021: £7.5 million).
Conclusion: Timely merger
One Housing has joined Riverside as a subsidiary and will retain its own subsidiary board for up to two years. After that, One Housing and Riverside will integrate into a single housing association and retain the Riverside name with one Board and leadership team. The combined group has a planning pipeline of 722 units. At both One Housing and Riverside, the emphasis was manor developments solely featuring on flats. The average planning application contained 361 units.
Over the past three years, One Housing has built or acquired 1,052 homes but in the latest year just 152 new homes were built, while 539 homes were disposed of and this illustrates that the drive form development will come from the rump Riverside business. However, during 2021/22 Riverside delivered 888 homes for affordable rent and shared ownership, which was less than anticipated in the group’s own plan and was due mainly to delays on site due to labour and material shortages.
A renewed commitment from central government to housing generally should be a benefit, but there is also greater emphasis being put on reviving council house building. This will increase competition for land not just in the social housing sector but also from commercial housebuilders, which makes the merger between One Housing opportune. A new corporate plan is being produced for the period 2023-2026, but the enlarged group will be amongst the top five RSLs in the UK and able to compete with rivals from all sectors in the development and management of new homes.
Winning Work with One Housing
Riverside has its own procurement department, which can be viewed here. In the summer of 2022, the group started procurement of a new £143 million term contract for housing repairs, which is due to run from 2023 to 2028 (Project ID: 17321236).
One Housing uses existing framework agreements, such as the Housing Procurement Portal, and is also one of more than 800 social housing providers to use the Procurement for Housing framework. All construction contracts for development work are let by the subsidiary, CHA Ventures. The group also has its own in-house contracting division, One Support, and also works with commercial housebuilders such as Fairview and Bellway.
In 2020, One Housing agreed a new five-year £3.9 million responsive repairs contract with Housing Solutions (Project ID: 18409902).
Key Riverside and One Housing procurement contacts include:
Riverside head of group procurement – Helen Marsh, tel: 0345 111 0000
One Housing director of procurement – Mark Jones, tel: 020-8821-5100