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Housing Statistics for Scotland 2007
20/11/2007
Updated housing statistics have been released today by Scotland's Chief Statistician.
Published online, the new Housing Statistics for Scotland web pages include comprehensive time series data to allow in-depth analyses of housing activity in Scotland up to June 30, 2007. The web launch is accompanied by the publication of a key trends summary.
Main points to emerge are as follows:
- New build completions show a decrease when compared to the two previous years (down to 23,700 in 2006-07 from 26,000-26,400 for 2005-06 and 2004-05 respectively), but are in line with earlier years (between 23,400-23,800 for the period between 2001-02 and 2003-04). New build starts show an increase over the previous year, confirming a longer term increase over the last four year period (up to 28,000 in 2006-07 from 22,900 in 2002-03)
- The numbers of Right to Buy sales by public authorities continue to show a declining trend since the expected increase prior to the introduction of modernised Right to Buy legislation in 2002. The latest figure for 2006-07 (about 8,500, including local authorities with total stock transfers) confirms the consistent decrease, and represents a drop of 19 per cent relative to 2005-06
- The percentage of lets to homeless people is a key indicator in measuring local authorities' capacity to respond to the 2012 target for the removal of the priority need test in homelessness legislation. Over the past couple of years, the proportions of local authority lets to homeless applicants have increased, with the latest figures confirming the observed upward trend. In 2006-07, 34 per cent of all local authority lettings were to homeless households, compared to 32 per cent for 2005-06. This represents a substantial increase compared to the situation a decade ago (12 per cent in 1996-97)
The Housing Statistics in Scotland web tables replace the quarterly Housing Trends in Scotland bulletins and will be updated regularly as new data becomes available.