Current Projects

Action on Empty Homes' four key projects:

London buy-to-leave and wealth investment

Our London 'Buy to Leave' and wealth investment project is about London homes that aren't housing anyone. Our starting point was to look at the thousands of London properties bought by investors, who leave them empty to store wealth or to sell-on at a profit. In the second half of 2019, we have been holding a series of public consultation events on what the GLA and the Government should be doing to stop this practice and how this relates to other categories of under-utilised property and homes without residents in London, from so-called 'second homes' to homes used primarily for Airbnb rental.

Community Action on Empty Homes toolkit

We are developing a toolkit resource for local authorities and community groups, to support community-led approaches to bringing empty homes into use as affordable housing for local people. See more in our blog on the projects initial stages.

The Coalition for Community Investment

The Coalition for Community Investment wants Government to champion community-based neighbourhood regeneration through investment to fund improvements to the existing empty housing stock.

Empty Homes in England

Our annual publication with analysis and data that gives the full picture of the national empty homes problem.

If you want to financially support or get involved in any of these projects then please get in touch

Latest

Will the last investor leaving Southwark please turn out the lights.. until Airbnb is back in business

New Government data shows how the Coronavirus pandemic shines a light on how we keep on building housing which doesn't house anyone: so homelessness rises, affordability declines and home ownership drops. Southwark is the canary in this particular coalmine.
Massive 20% rise in empty homes up over 42,000 to 268,385 while 100,000 families are stuck in Temporary Accommodation

Government data released today shows a massive year on year rise of over 42,000 to a total of 268,385 long-term empty homes in England, as nearly 100,000 families languish in temporary accommodation. This is the biggest rise since current records began.
Can New Zealand’s new Labour Government turn round decades of housing failure?

Our research volunteer Bill Golden asks whether Jacinda Ardern's landslide victory on the back of tackling the pandemic and domestic terrorism stands her in good stead to deal with New Zealand's knottiest public policy challenge - its longstanding housing crisis.
No Address? No Access To Services...

Chris Bailey explains how a ProxyAddress can help people facing homelessness and our campaign to turn proxy addresses into real addresses

Will the last investor leaving Southwark please turn out the lights.. until Airbnb is back in business

New Government data shows how the Coronavirus pandemic shines a light on how we keep on building housing which doesn't house anyone: so homelessness rises, affordability declines and home ownership drops. Southwark is the canary in this particular coalmine.
Massive 20% rise in empty homes up over 42,000 to 268,385 while 100,000 families are stuck in Temporary Accommodation

Government data released today shows a massive year on year rise of over 42,000 to a total of 268,385 long-term empty homes in England, as nearly 100,000 families languish in temporary accommodation. This is the biggest rise since current records began.
Where are Haringey's Second Homes?

Why is Haringey the only council in the country not submitting crucial housing data to the Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government?
Pretty Vacant

Our new report on why the next 500 high-rise towers in London won't end the capitals's housing crisis. And how they will make it worse.
What we do

Action on Empty Homes campaigns for empty homes to be brought into use for people in housing need. We raise awareness, campaign for policy change, provide advice and research and develop ideas to help bring empty homes into use
Empty Homes England 2019 is available now

Our new annual report on the state of the empty homes problem in England reports the second consecutive annual increase in numbers to over 216,000 and the fastest rise in a decade
Publications and Research

We produce four types of publications: Campaign publications advocating policy responses to end the waste of empty homes Research and analysis of the issue including Empty Homes in England, the only comprehensive annual analysis of official data Reports on active programmes to bring empty homes into use Practical toolkits to support those working in the field
Meet the team

Our staff team and Board of Trustees work closely together to ensure that Action on Empty Homes campaigns for change in the most effective way.
Why empty homes matter

There are over 216,000 homes long-term empty when England needs over 300,000 additional homes each year. Bringing long-term empty homes back into use will also help rebuild neighbourhoods and make environmental sense.
The solutions

We believe in community-led action to tackle empty homes, encouraged by active local authorities to support grassroots initiatives, underpinned by a government investment strategy to bring long-term empties back into use.