Affordable Housing Statement: the schedule that matters

The narrative part of an Affordable Housing Statement takes an afternoon. The schedule takes a week, and it is the only part a housing officer reads closely. Everything that matters commercially is in the table: how many units, in which tenure, at what size, where on the site, when they are delivered and on what terms they transfer.

Officers compare that schedule against the adopted policy and against the drawings. Where the three do not agree, the application stalls until they do, and the reason is almost always arithmetic rather than policy.

What the statement is for

It demonstrates that the scheme complies with the affordable housing policy in the adopted development plan, or explains why it cannot and what is offered instead. It is normally required by the local validation list for schemes at or above the local threshold, which the national framework ties to major development, with lower thresholds available in designated rural areas.

National policy also expects a proportion of homes on major sites to be available for affordable home ownership, subject to exemptions, and sets out the categories that count as affordable housing in its glossary. The framework re-issued on 17 August 2026 uses policy codes rather than paragraph numbers, so check the current wording and the exemption list on gov.uk rather than quoting from an older statement.

The statement does not decide anything. It records an offer in a form the authority can convert into a planning obligation.

The schedule, and why it is the document

A complete schedule carries one row per unit type and tenure, with these columns.

Tenure, named precisely rather than described loosely. Affordable housing for rent, social rent where the policy distinguishes it, shared ownership, First Homes, discounted market sale, affordable private rent on a build to rent scheme.

Unit type, bedroom count and person count. The person count matters because policy mixes are often expressed in bed spaces and because it drives the floor area standard.

Gross internal area in m², against the Nationally Described Space Standard where the authority has adopted it. Habitable rooms, because a policy percentage expressed by habitable room needs them.

Accessibility standard, identifying which units meet the optional higher standards for accessible and adaptable dwellings and which are wheelchair user dwellings. These are counted separately from the tenure split and should not be double-counted to inflate either.

Parking allocation, block or core reference, floor level, and the phase in which the unit is delivered.

Then two numbers underneath: the percentage of the total scheme that is affordable, calculated both by unit and by habitable room, and the tenure split within that as a percentage.

Unit or habitable room: the percentage trap

Adopted policies express the affordable requirement either as a percentage of units or as a percentage of habitable rooms, and some London boroughs use floorspace. The difference is not cosmetic.

A scheme that delivers its affordable provision mainly as one and two bedroom flats, while the market housing includes three and four bedroom units, will show a higher percentage by unit than by habitable room. On a scheme of a hundred homes the gap between the two measures can be several units of provision.

Read the policy wording and calculate on its basis. Then show the other measure as well, because an officer who has to work out the second number themselves will assume you chose the flattering one. You probably did.

Tenure mix and the national requirements

The adopted plan sets the tenure split, usually as a ratio between rented and intermediate products. Start there, then overlay the national requirements.

First Homes form a proportion of the affordable housing where the national requirement applies, with a minimum discount to market value and price caps after discount. The figures and the policy status have moved since the requirement was introduced, so verify the current position in Planning Practice Guidance before you build the schedule around them.

Build to rent schemes are treated differently again, with affordable private rent provided at a discount to market rent and secured for a defined period rather than transferred to a registered provider. The London Plan sets out the approach for London, and authorities elsewhere have adopted varying positions.

Three practical points on tenure. Engage a registered provider early and name them in the statement if you can, because an offer with a provider behind it is more credible than one without. Check service charges on shared ownership units, since a charge that makes a unit unaffordable to the target household defeats the provision. And confirm that the rented units can actually be let at the policy rent given their size and service charge, rather than assuming.

Location, phasing and the obligations

Clustering is the issue officers raise most often after the percentage. Policies generally expect affordable units to be distributed through the scheme rather than concentrated in one block, with the same external appearance and the same access arrangements as the market housing.

Where clustering is unavoidable, usually because a registered provider needs a manageable core or because service charges differ, explain the reason. A clear explanation is accepted considerably more often than a silent cluster.

Phasing is the other commercial lever. The obligation will tie affordable delivery to triggers expressed as a number or percentage of market units occupied, and the drafting determines your cash flow. Ask for triggers you can meet in sequence, and avoid any trigger that requires affordable completion before market sales have generated receipts.

The transfer terms go in the obligation rather than the statement, though the statement should summarise them: the transfer price basis, the nominations arrangement with the authority, the cascade if no registered provider acquires the units, and the mortgagee exclusion clause that the provider's funder will require.

On larger schemes the affordable offer also feeds the wider social evidence base, where housing quality and affordability appear as determinants in health impact assessment screening and scoping matrices.

Where statements fall over

Five failures account for most of the delay.

The schedule and the drawings disagree. Unit counts, bedroom numbers and floor areas have to match the submitted plans exactly, including any revision made after the schedule was written. Someone has to check the final set against the final table, and on most schemes nobody is formally asked to.

The percentage is stated on one basis without saying which. A bare percentage with no denominator identified reads as an attempt to avoid the question.

Floor areas fall below the adopted space standard. This is usually discovered by the housing officer rather than the planner, late, and it changes the layout.

Accessibility units are counted twice, once towards the accessible standard and once as an uplift in the affordable offer. Officers see this regularly.

And the affordable position in the statement does not match the position in the Planning Statement or the viability case. Where the scheme falls below policy, the Viability Assessment and the affordable housing statement have to describe the same offer in the same terms. They are often written by different people in different weeks, and officers read them side by side.

The honest uncertainty on most schemes is the registered provider's appetite. Provider requirements on unit mix, floor areas, core arrangements and service charges change with their own funding position, and a schedule agreed in principle in March can need reworking in September. Build a little flexibility into the obligation drafting rather than into the schedule, where the authority will see it as a weakness.

This is general guidance, not legal advice. Check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

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