1.5m homes could cost £300-525bn

Labour’s 1.5 million homes promise now rests on a simple arithmetic problem: recent delivery rates in England are below the pace needed. (fullfact.org) (housingforum.org.uk) The target refers to 1.5 million net additional dwellings in England over this parliament, not just homes started on site or homes completed. Full Fact says ministers confirmed that definition after earlier confusion over the metric. (fullfact.org) The Housing Forum said England completed 199,300 new homes in 2024-25, down from 221,070 in 2023-24. That leaves roughly 1.3 million homes to add over the following four years, or about 325,000 a year. (housingforum.org.uk) PropertyWire reported on April 26 that the government had delivered just over 300,000 new homes in the first 18 months of the parliament, nearly a third below the pace needed. Its report pointed to labour constraints, higher material costs and planning bottlenecks. (propertywire.com) Ministers argue the pipeline should improve. HM Treasury said on March 26 that the Office for Budget Responsibility expects planning reforms to lift housebuilding to its highest level in more than 40 years and add 170,000 homes by 2029/30. (gov.uk) That same Treasury statement said the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast the government was on track for an extra 1.3 million homes by the end of the parliament, with further reforms and housing programs not yet included. (gov.uk) Housing groups and advisers say planning changes alone will not close the gap. A report commissioned by the National Housing Federation said the government could miss the target by nearly half a million homes without more support for social housing and first-time buyers. (housing.org.uk) That report, based on Savills analysis, said the likely shortfall could reach 95,000 homes a year on average. It argued the private market would struggle to absorb the roughly 200,000 homes a year for sale that the target implies without extra demand support. (housing.org.uk) Cost pressure has eased from the worst of the inflation spike, but it has not disappeared. Savills said residential tender prices rose 2.3% in the year to the first quarter of 2025 and BCIS expected annual increases of 2.8% in 2025 and 2.7% in 2026. (savills.com) Savills also said new labour costs, building-safety rules and the planned Building Safety Levy are squeezing viability, especially on brownfield sites in London. Some Gateway 2 approvals for taller buildings were taking more than 40 weeks. (savills.com) The government has tried to answer the funding side with a bigger affordable housing program. BCIS said the June 2025 Spending Review allocated £39 billion to the Affordable Homes Programme, including £4.8 billion in financial transactions between 2026-27 and 2029-30 to catalyse private investment. (bcis.co.uk) But BCIS said that cash does not give ministers direct control over how fast private developers build, and it still questioned whether the 1.5 million goal was feasible. The debate has shifted from whether land can be released to who will fund, buy and build enough homes quickly enough. (bcis.co.uk) (rics.org)