Rents for social housing from 2020-21

We are proposing to issue a new direction from the Secretary of State to the Regulator of Social Housing to ensure that, from 2020 onwards, the Regulator’s rent standard:

• reflects our announcement in October 2017 that we intend to permit registered providers to increase their rents by up to CPI+1% each year, for a period of at least 5 years; this announcement recognised the need for a stable financial environment to support the delivery of new homes

• applies to local authority registered providers (as well as to private registered providers), to reflect the roll out of Universal Credit

The direction also sets out the basis on which social rents and affordable rents are set.