People have started moving into their new homes in a North Yorkshire village at a housing association’s latest rural development. Among the people settling at the Broadacres’ scheme in Huby, near Easingwold, are couple Chris Brain and Sarah Collinson. They have moved into their two-bedroom home with their nine-month-old daughter Isabella.
Chris, a truck driver, was brought up three miles from Huby in Stillington and still has family in the village said: “The house we were living in was privately rented but it was small, had single glazed windows and damp and was miles away from any local amenities. Now, we have a shop in the village where we can get milk for Isabella, as well as other day-to-day essentials, and a doctors’ surgery close, so the location is perfect. More importantly, aside from the quality of the house and it being much more suitable for our needs, we are paying less than when we rented privately, so means we are able to save money and buy more things for Isabella. Broadacres told us to treat the home like it’s our own and that’s a massive deal, and we couldn’t be happier with the way things have worked out for us.”
Broadacres, with its developing partner Esh Construction, built the 12 new homes on land in the centre of Huby, as part of a £1.8 million investment. The two and three-bedroom properties, which include eight rented homes and four shared ownership homes, are all being allocated to people with a connection to Huby or the wider Hambleton area. This forms part of Broadacres’ strategy to ensure rural communities remain affordable and sustainable for future generations.
Broadacres’ Chief Executive Gail Teasdale said: “We are delighted to have completed work on our latest affordable rural housing development in North Yorkshire. Like our other schemes, they are providing much-needed homes for local people keen to remain in the areas where they grew up or work, and Chris and Sarah are an excellent example of this. It’s important that village communities like Huby remain sustainable for future generations and that’s why a development like this is so important.”
It is fantastic to see people are now moving into the completed Broadacres' homes where sustainability has been a key priority for developers. Given the mix of rental and shared ownership options, there are houses to suit a variety of needs and financial situations. I hope to see more schemes such as this in the constituency and will be championing this in Parliament at every opportunity.
