Ashley Ilsen, chief executive of the development finance lender, warned that drastic action is needed to get even close to house building targets.
The government must do more to support SME builders and developers or risk facing increasing supply issues in the future, Ashley Ilsen, chief executive of Magnet Capital, has warned.
Figures from the National Housing Building Council (NHBC) have revealed that the number of new homes registered to be built in Q3 decreased by 9% when compared with 2018’s output.
In 2018 some 43,403 homes were registered in the third quarter, this has dropped to 39,364 in 2019.
He said: “Ultimately the government need to be doing more for SME builders and developers who are facing what is already an uphill struggle.
"We regularly hear complaints from our clients about the rising costs of building new houses; anything from labour to supplies have been on a steady increase of late.
"When this is twinned with a flat property market all that leads to is a squeeze on margins, making opportunities for developers scarcer."
Firing a shot across the government's bow Ilsen warned that house building targets will never be achieved without drastic change.
"There needs to be a bigger push from the government to incentivise people to build homes again.
"We all know we’re a long way away from the targets that we are supposed to meet and this is not going to improve without drastic changes to both the demand and the supply side."
"I was a big fan of help-to-buy when it was first introduced however this was only supposed to be a temporary short-term fix, and not long-term dependency as it appears to have morphed into.
"There is a distinct lack of dynamism and forward thinking from our government when it comes to housebuilding and sadly I don’t see this changing anytime soon.”
It has been claimed that housebuilding may need to increase by up to a third between 2021 and 2025 to make up for the end of the current Help to Buy scheme in 2023.
