Aviva completes social housing funding arrangement

Aviva Investors has announced a new funding loan from its REaLM (Returns Enhancing and Liability Matching) Social Housing Fund, secured on a portfolio of 307 residential properties in London and the home counties.

The loan is with the Genesis Housing Association, which will keep the proceeds from the sale of further portions of shared ownership properties to homeowners. Aviva said that the funding from its social housing fund allows registered providers to unlock latent capacity within the retained equity of shared ownership properties, and raise long-term, institutional financing in manageable lot sizes, without any sales.

REaLM Social Housing fund manager, Martin Zdravkov, said: “The flexibility of pension fund-backed investors is one of the best kept secrets in finance, when it does not have to be so. As a comprehensive funder with a long history of supporting affordable housing and registered providers, we offer the full array of financing alternatives, including tailor-made propositions such as this one.” Genesis Housing Association executive director, resources, Elizabeth Frounde, commented: “By just thinking a little more innovatively to tie the funding and interest to the rental stream of the property type, we have been able to maximise the available funding from a property tenure often seen as less attractive by mainstream lenders.”