ART Homes Reaches 1000th Loan
Birmingham based ART Homes Ltd, an innovative not for profit financial organisation which offers specialist home improvement loans to homeowners who cannot get a loan through high street lenders, is celebrating recently completing its 1000th loan.
Established in 2000, ART Homes was acquired by Mercian Housing Association in December 2003. ART Homes is Authorised and Regulated by the FSA and works in partnership with local authorities and strategic housing organisations to assist them in meeting local housing needs by providing affordable loans to householders who have a low income or are on benefits and need to undertake maintenance, repairs or improvements to their homes.
Since making its first loan in 2003, ART Homes has provided affordable loans to 1000 households with a total value of £15 million.
Roger Clark, Director of ART Homes Ltd, said of the milestone, “The PAL® equity release loan developed by ART Homes has proved to be a major success, by being both affordable and acceptable to low income homeowners and enabling Local Authorities help many more people than would be possible with grants.”
Homeowners in the West Midlands who have had their home transformed and their standard of living enhanced through the completion of essential repairs to their home, with the help of ART Homes, have been very happy with the service they received. A recent customer satisfaction survey carried out by ART Homes showed overall service was rated ‘excellent’ or ‘good’ by 98% of respondents.
Although its main focus is in the West Midlands, ART Homes now works now on a national basis, having contracts with the NewHeartlands Housing Market Renewal Initiative in Merseyside, Edinburgh City Council and is currently running a pilot scheme in South Wales.
A small scheme to enable first-time buyers to secure a property in West Sussex is also currently in progress.
In addition, winning top awards in the categories of ‘Excellence in Delivering Mixed Communities’ and ‘Outstanding Achievement in Social Housing in England’ at the prestigious UK Housing Awards 2006, as part of the West Midlands Kick Start Partnership, ART Homes proves that loan based schemes are becoming well accepted and established as a way of funding improvements for low income homeowners.
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Press Enquiries please contact Vicky Jones on 0121 377 88 99 or email vjones@mercian.org.uk.