Equity impact project in homes

The challenge

Over the last 5 years, increasing amounts of private, capital have flowed into residential housing, helping to address the chronic under-supply of affordable homes. The National Housing Federation estimates £12.8 billion is needed every year for the next 10 years to adequately respond to this shortage. However, there are no standards or guidelines to help steward this investment, making sure it achieves positive outcomes for the housing market and the people in greatest housing need, particularly those on lower incomes.

Our approach

Since June 2020, we’ve been engaged in a collaborative project alongside The Good Economy, Big Society Capital and a working group of 10 investment fund managers, with the support of Trowers and Hamlins and the Association of Real Estate Funds (AREF).

Our approach

Our aim has been to create a sector-standard impact measurement approach for equity investments in social and affordable housing, targeting the funds leading this new inflow of capital.​ Through this, we aim to bring consistency and transparency to how fund impact is articulated, measured and managed.

This is the second of three projects designed to develop a unified standard approach to environmental, social and governance (ESG) and impact reporting across the investment value chain, building on the success of the ESG White Paper project.​

Impact and learning

Our ultimate aim is to help steward impact capital towards positive outcomes for society, by developing a set of sector-owned standards, governed independently and aligned with the other emerging global non-financial sustainability reporting standards. We’re now developing the framework, with the working group set to report in Q4 2020.