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Notes and definitions
SOURCES
Most of the figures are compiled by the Scottish Executive, which collects the data from local authorities and Communities Scotland. The source of information is the Scottish Executive Housing Statistics Branch, unless otherwise stated in the footnotes.
AREA COVERED
Except where otherwise stated, all tables relate to Scotland.
DWELLINGS
A dwelling is a building or any part of a building which forms a separate and self-contained set of premises designed to be occupied by a family or, in some cases, groups of individuals (such as hostels or cluster flat). Temporary dwellings are excluded.
TENURE
Private sector . This includes dwellings owned by private landlords, whether persons or companies, and owner-occupiers.
Housing associations. These are societies, bodies of trustees, or companies established for the purpose of providing housing accommodation on a non-profit making basis. They also provide housing for special groups such as the aged, disabled, single persons, or housing on a mutual or self-build basis. In recent years, associations have extended their activities into provision of low cost housing for home ownership. In addition, registered associations (those registered with Scottish Homes / Communities Scotland) are heavily engaged in the regeneration of inner city areas through both rehabilitation and new building.
Non-registered associations are, in the main, now operating on a management basis only.
New Towns. In Scotland, New Town Development Corporations were established under the New Towns Acts for the purpose of laying out and developing New Towns. The New Towns in each region, with their designation and wind-up dates, are as follows:
Cumbernauld, Strathclyde Region (est. December 1955): Wound-up 31 December 1996. 1,275 houses were transferred to North Lanarkshire Council and 2,200 houses were transferred to Scottish Homes on 30 September 1996.
East Kilbride, Strathclyde Region (est. May 1947): Wound-up 31 December 1995. 7,834 houses were transferred to East Kilbride District Council (now South Lanarkshire Council) at the end of November 1995.
Glenrothes, Fife Region (est. June 1948): Wound-up 31 December 1995. 4,783 houses and 2,700 garages were transferred to Kirkcaldy District Council (now Fife Council) on 28 September 1995.
Irvine, Strathclyde Region (est. November 1966): Wound-up 31 December 1996. 1,978 houses were transferred to North Ayrshire Council and 715 houses were transferred to Irvine Housing Association on 29 November 1996.
Livingston, Lothian Region (est. April 1962): Wound-up 31 December 1996. 3,651 houses were transferred to West Lothian Council on 1 November 1996. 1,516 houses were transferred to Almond Housing Association on 29 October 1996, and 66 sheltered houses were transferred to Bield Housing Association on 21 October 1996.
Communities Scotland. This is an executive agency that replaced Scottish Homes on 1 November 2001. Communities Scotland works on behalf of Ministers to promote social justice and tackle exclusion through the delivery of sustainable community regeneration.
Stock transfers. Dumfries and Galloway, Glasgow and Scottish Borders councils have transferred their housing stock to not-for-profit registered social landlords. As a result, figures for these authorities are not reported in local authority tables. Following the transfer of housing stock by Scottish Homes in June 2005, figures for Scottish Homes will similarly not be reported with the local authority details. Data collection and reporting procedures are currently being reviewed in conjunction with Communities Scotland in order to provide an accurate picture of Scottish housing tenancy.
KEY INDICATORS ( Table 1)
Dwellings allocated by local authorities. This is the number of applicants allocated houses by local authorities, including non-local authority stock to which the local authority has allocation rights.
New lets . This is the number of houses allocated to waiting list applicants and to other applicants such as those housed under the National Mobility Scheme or under Part II of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1987. Other transfers and exchanges are not included in this percentage.
Lets to homeless. This is the number of houses allocated to applicants under Part II of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1987.
STOCK ESTIMATES BY TENURE ( Table 2)
Estimates of the dwelling stock are based on the 1991 and 2001 Censuses, which include a count of the number of dwellings. The baseline tenure at the end of the year is derived through combining information from the Census, the Post Census Survey of Vacant Dwellings and public authorities' stock counts.
Estimating the tenure split of dwelling stock from the Census requires some assumptions about tenure of vacant dwellings where information on tenure was not collected directly at the time. The 2001 Post Census Vacant Survey did not assess tenure of privately owned properties, and the tenure splits from the Census have been applied to this case.
This baseline is updated each year using information provided by local authorities on new house building, conversion of property to housing use, and demolitions, together with public authorities' stock counts and Scottish Homes'/Communities Scotland's data on housing association stock.
Transfers of stock from one sector to another must also be taken into account, for example sales of public authority dwellings to tenants (owner occupiers). Most of this information on stock transfers is also provided directly to the Scottish Executive. However, no regular information is available on transfers from the private rented sector into owner occupation, and such changes in tenure have not been taken into account when producing the estimates.
FINANCIAL KEY INDICATORS ( Table 4)
Housing Tender Price Index. The Housing Tender Price Index, compiled by the Scottish Executive Construction Advice & Policy Division, measures the overall change in contractors' pricing levels in Scottish public sector housing projects. It includes successful tenders for 1-4 storey public sector housing contracts throughout mainland Scotland. Using a standard sampling methodology, items to a minimum value of 25% of each trade are selected from Bills of Quantities, are compared with a predetermined price base, and are weighted according to the proportionate value of the trade to the total Bill. The index figure is derived from the arithmetic mean of each quarter's sample. Tenders are allocated to the quarter in which the tender date falls.
Any enquiries about the index should be addressed to the Scottish Executive Finance and Central Services Department: Construction Advice and Policy Division, Victoria Quay, Edinburgh EH6 6QQ.
Telephone: Gordon Anderson, 0131 244 7479
E-mail: gordon.anderson@scotland.gsi.gov.uk.
Residential property transactions and mortgage completions ( Table 5)
Registers of Scotland data. Sale price data come from information supplied to the Registers of Scotland with new applications to register the transfer of title in a property sale. Each application identifies the property type, distinguishing residential properties from those for commercial properties, land and other types.
All changes of ownership are recorded, including cash sales. As part of the registration process, the applicant's agent records the price of the transaction. Depending on the type of transfer, it is possible for this to be a small nominal sum or below the true market value of the property.
Data on volume and value of transactions published by Registers of Scotland exclude transactions under £20,000 and those over £1,000,000 on the grounds that low value transactions are unlikely to represent the full market value, and high value transactions are relatively infrequent and liable to skew the estimated average.
Survey of Mortgage Lenders.The Department for Communities and Local Government (and its former incarnations the Department of the Environment, the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the Department for Transport, Local Government and the Regions, and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister) have produced a quarterly house price index since 1968 based on data from the Survey of Mortgage Lenders ( SML). The survey was conducted in partnership with the Council of Mortgage Lenders ( CML) and previously involved a variety of mortgage lenders supplying a monthly 5% sample of mortgage completions.
In the past couple of years, many lenders have been supplying 100% samples through electronic data capture. The increased sample size (approximately 25,000 cases per month for the UK initially) has allowed the production of a revised monthly index in 2003.
There has been no change to the methodology but the data source changed in September 2005. The house price index is now based on an enlarged sample of completions data (about 45,000 per month) from about 50 mortgage lenders who supply data through the Regulated Mortgage Survey ( RMS) of the Council of Mortgage Lenders/BankSearch.
The change in reporting has been due to requirements by the Financial Services Authority ( FSA) that UK mortgage lenders compile certain information relating to mortgage completions that the lenders have financed (excluding buy-to-lets). After considering the implications of this new development, the Department (now the Department for Communities and Local Government) and CML took the view that it would be a major duplication of effort for lenders to supply data to the FSA and, at the same time, to continue their voluntary participation in the existing SML.
There is currently a special arrangement between the FSA, CML and the Department to provide the information for the house price index. This is based on statutory reporting required by the FSA that is also supplied voluntarily by lenders to the CML.
Some of the information supplied by lenders is required by the FSA. As a result, complete information is now available on some variables, for example whether the borrower is a first time buyer or a sitting tenant. Consequently a structural change in the data is likely to have occurred. Although index weights are used that reflect the pattern of property transactions over the past three years, when examining the mix-adjusted prices for August there were differences between the SML and the RMS data. The house price index and house prices for August will remain the SML figures reported on 10th October. However to maintain comparability across 2005 both the prices and house price indices for the two data sources have been chain linked at August. In effect, this means that the average, mix-adjusted house prices from RMS data are adjusted to be on the same basis as the average prices from SML data. This adjustment will continue until annual chain-linking is applied for January, 2006. After that, average house prices will be derived solely from RMS data
House Price Index . The House Price Index is the weighted average of prices of a standard collection of dwellings. The index is adjusted for changes in the mix of properties. The initial quarterly series based on building society lending was terminated in 1993, when a series based on a sample of mortgage completions by all types of lender was established. Details of the methods by which the 1993-based index was constructed were published in Economic Trends, No. 348, October 1982.
In 2003, the index was revised to incorporate methodological improvements and a much larger sample from the Survey of Mortgage Lenders (see above). The index is now published as a monthly series with 2002 as the base year. Details of the index can be found in the house prices area on the DCLG website ( http://www.communities.gov.uk/).
Average income . Average income details are for mortgage loan purposes as recorded by the Scottish mortgage lenders.
HOUSE BUILDING ( Tables 6-8)
Started. A dwelling is regarded as started on the date that work begins on the foundations of the block of which the dwelling will form a part, and not on the date when site preparations begin.
Completed. A dwelling is completed when it is ready for occupation, whether it is in fact occupied or not. If a dwelling is transferred to another agency after completion it is considered to have been completed by the first agency.
Social sector HOUSE SALES ( Tables 9-11)
Part III of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1987, as amended, gives most Scottish secure tenants the right to buy their homes, provided they are eligible and their home is not exempt. The 'applications to sitting tenants' figures in all tables concerning public authority house sales include right to buy, rent to mortgage, and voluntary sales.
For right to buy sales, the selling price is determined by the market value of the property less a discount (as laid down in section 62 of the Act). In turn, the level of discount is heavily reliant upon when the pre-purchase tenancy commenced, with those starting after 30 September 2002 being subject to modernised right to buy terms. Under the previous terms, the minimum discount in respect of a house is 32% after two years, plus an additional 1% for each year, up to a maximum discount of 60%. For flats, the minimum discount is 44% of the market value, plus an additional 2% for each year beyond two years occupation by the tenant, up to a maximum discount of 70%.
Under modernised right to buy, there is a single discount structure for all property types which starts at 20% of market value after the initial five-year qualifying period and then increases by 1% a year up to a maximum of 35% or £15,000, whichever is lower. Applications to purchase may include an element of the 'cost floor', which is covered by section 62(6A) of the 1987 Act and a specific determination. Under the cost floor rules, a discount may be restricted where the price, taking into account the discount to which the tenant is entitled, is less than the admissible costs incurred in providing, improving or maintaining the house over a period broadly 10 years prior to the application to purchase being submitted.
Houses owned by non-charitable housing associations came within the right to buy legislation in January 1987. For voluntary sales, the Secretary of State has issued a general consent permitting discounts of 30% for houses and 40% for flats, plus an additional 1% and 2% respectively for houses and flats for each year of tenancy up to maximum levels of 60% and 70%.
Rent to mortgage sales were first introduced as a pilot scheme in October 1989 for tenants of Scottish Homes/Communities Scotland and the New Town Development Corporations. From 1 April 1991 this was extended to local authority tenants. A new statutory rent to mortgage Scheme for all public authority tenants was introduced on 27 September 1993 via the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993. However, the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001 repealed the rent to mortgage scheme with effect from 30 September 2002 (this did not affect people already buying through this mechanism).
PUBLIC SECTOR VACANT STOCK ( TABLE 15)
Vacant dwellings may be unoccupied for a number of reasons. Dwellings may be vacant as part of a planned disposal programme, or during major modernisation or repair work; or they may be in areas of low demand.
All vacant dwellings not in one of those categories are considered to be in high/medium demand areas.
HOUSES IN MULTIPLE OCCUPATION
( TABLES 16-18)
This form was revised in 2001 in order to monitor the new mandatory licensing scheme for Houses in Multiple Occupation ( HMOs) which came into force on 1 October 2000.
For the purposes of this return, an HMO is a building or part of a building that forms a separate and self-contained set of premises and is used as shared accommodation. An HMO includes a building containing housing units that, although otherwise separate, share use of a sanitary convenience, personal washing facilities or cooking facilities.
HMOs may include flats, bedsits, lodgings, bed and breakfast accommodation and other communal accommodation such as student residences and hostels. However, this does not mean that all dwellings within each category will necessarily constitute an HMO. This will depend on occupancy and whether the living units have their own bathroom and kitchen facilities or not.
To be classified as a licensable HMO, the accommodation must be the 'only or principle residence of a specified number of people who are not members of either the same family or of one or other of two families. The HMO licensing scheme covers both official leasing and other less conventional forms of arrangement. The occupancy threshold requiring a licence from 1 October 2000 to 30 September 2001 is six or more people. This was reduced annually until reaching the current minimum level of three or more in 2003.
Local authority owned HMOs are included in the figures. Accommodation covered by the Regulation of Care (Scotland) Act 2001, along with a small number of properties in other categories, is exempted from HMO licensing and does not appear in these figures.
RENT REGISTRATION SERVICE STATISTICS
( Tables 29-31)
Housing benefit cases referred under the Housing (Scotland) Act 1988. Local authorities are required to refer most claims for housing benefit from private sector tenants to rent officers. The rent officer may either:
- accept the referred rent, or
- determine a market level rent for the property if the referred rent is significantly above a market level, or
- determine a notional rent for a property of the appropriate size if the size of the accommodation exceeds the needs of the tenants, or
- determine a notional rent determination which is not exceptionally high if the referred rent or the lowest of the above determinations is exceptionally high compared with accommodation of the same (or suitable) size in the locality.
The claim related rent for the purposes of Table 29 is the minimum of (a) - (d).
Local reference rents. Since 2 January 1996, rent officers have also been required to make an additional determination known as a local reference rent ( LRR). The objective is to limit housing benefit to the general level of rents for accommodation of the same size (number of rooms) in the locality. The rent officer determines the LRR by calculating the midpoint of the range of rents (excluding exceptionally high and exceptionally low rents) for properties of the same size in the same locality.
Pre-tenancy determinations ( PTDs). A new system of PTDs was introduced on 2 January 1996. These enable prospective tenants and their landlords to obtain an indication of the maximum rent likely to be used to calculate housing benefit entitlement, prior to their commencement of the tenancy. An application for a PTD can be made via the appropriate Council by anyone who is considering renting or who is already renting accommodation from a private landlord, is negotiating a new tenancy, and intends to claim housing benefit. A PTD is valid for a particular tenancy for one year. It applies to the original applicant and any subsequent applicants with the same household composition, provided the terms of the tenancy do not change.
Tenancies registered under the Rent (Scotland) Act 1984, as amended by the Housing (Scotland) Act 1988. Prior to 2 January 1989 most lettings by non-resident private landlords and housing association tenancies could have a 'fair' rent registered by the rent officer. In assessing a fair rent, rent officers must follow the rules laid down in the Rent (Scotland) Act 1984 that require consideration of all the circumstances of the tenancy (except personal ones), and the condition of the dwelling. They will take particular account of age, state of repair, character and locality of the dwelling, but will disregard any amount attributable to scarcity of similar accommodation in the area. After three years, unless there is a substantial change in the condition of the property during this period, a revised rent may be re-registered.
The Housing (Scotland) Act 1988 deregulated new lettings after 2 January 1989. Existing regulated tenancies continue to be covered by the Rent Act legislation as amended. The transitional arrangements mean that there may also continue to be some tenancies registering for the first time. These could include tenancies established before January 1989 that have never been registered, as well as housing association and private sector fair rent tenants with existing secure tenancies who are moving to a different property within the same housing association or under the same landlord.
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