Our rent and service charge increase explained

From Monday 6th April 2023, our new rent and service charges will be in place. 

We understand the challenges that people are facing with increased costs of living, and the impact that raising costs may have, so we take our rent setting very seriously. The costs of operating as a business and meeting the needs of our communities have increased, and as a result, we have had to make some challenging decisions.

In previous years the rent increase was set in line with September’s national measure of inflation* +1%. This could have led to an increase of around 11%.

However, this year the Government has capped the increase at 7%. We have used this increase to calculate your new rent. This ensures that Aspire Housing can meet the rising costs of managing, maintaining, and building homes, and can strive to provide the best possible services for our customers.

Aspire Housing is a not-for-profit company. This means that all rent is used to run services, to build and maintain homes, to reinvest into our communities, and to meet the necessary costs of managing a business. No profit is gained and there are no shareholders who benefit.

As a business, we have an annual turnover of around £50 million, we employ approximately 400 people locally, manage over 9,000 homes, and work with a wide range of local suppliers and businesses. We invest millions in our homes and communities, help to keep our tenants safe and build aspirational new homes to tackle the social housing crisis.

Your home

This year we will continue our commitment to investment in existing homes, with planned spending of more than £100 million on improvements, repairs and cyclical work from 2022-2027.

In the next year alone we plan to spend almost £21 million, of which £11 million will be on upgrades to existing homes. As usual, we will continue to share further details of our programme with you throughout the year via our social media accounts and directly on our website.

It has been a challenging year for our repairs team along with many other organisations, through difficulties with recruiting and retaining staff and the rising cost and availability of materials. We have listened to customer feedback and we are investing to improve the service that customers receive.

You can find out more about how we perform in 'How are we doing' section.

New homes

In 2023/24 we will create over 150 new homes for people in our communities and are planning to build or acquire almost 1,000 new homes in the next 5 years to help tackle the housing crisis.

What support is available?

We understand that an increase in your rent, alongside additional rises you may be experiencing in other living costs, may be worrying. 

But please be assured that we’re here to help.

Our Money Advice Team can provide advice on checking benefits, managing debts, helping with budgets and general advice on how to make the most of your money. If you are struggling to afford your household bills, take a look at our cost of living page on our website or come along to one of our Cost of Living drop-ins: