Welsh Journals

Search over 450 titles and 1.2 million pages

RURAL HOUSING ASSOCIATIONS AND THE RENTED SECTOR MARKET: A MID WALES CASE STUDY PAULJ. CLOKE AND GARETH W. EDWARDS Cloke, P.J. and Edwards, G.W. 1985: Rural Housing Associations and the Rented Sector Market: A Mid Wales Case Study. Cambria, Vol. 12(2), pp. 139 to pp. 153. Part II of Davies, W.K.D. (ed) Human Geography from Wales: Proceedings of the E.G. Bowen Memorial Conference. ISSN 0306-9796. The apparent inability of local authorities to respond to the changing demands for housing has led to a revival of interest in the contribution of local housing associations to this problem. A case study of the demand and supply of housing in Dyfed in rural Wales is followed by a survey of Cymdeithas Tai Dyffryn Teifi, showing how this particular association has helped to fill in some of the gaps in housing provision. Paul Cloke and Gareth Edwards, Department of Geography, Saint David's University College, Lampeter, Dyfed, Wales, SA 487ED, U.K. In recent years great store has been placed on the ability of new housing agencies to make a successful intervention into rural housing markets. It is clear from the increasingly bountiful rural housing literature (for example Clark 1981; Dunn et. al. 1981; Phillips and Williams 1982, 1984; and Shucksmith 1981) that market oriented housing provision mechanisms have produced significant imbalances between supply and need. Accordingly, those groups who are able to fund an adventitious entry into rural housing markets have dominated proceedings to the detriment of those for whom housing opportunities are restricted by dint of finance or location. Also, it has been shown (Cloke 1983) that the planning process has in some circumstances been instrumental in exacerbating these trends of polarisation of the housing clientele. In settlements perceived as small, attractive and worthy of conservation, planning has restricted new low-cost housing so that existing stock, and any prestigious new developments which meet strict planning conditions, have escalated in price. At the same time, the rented sector has equally failed to provide for low income rural households. The recent financiål restrictions imposed by central government on local authorities have led to a rapid deceleration in council house building, whilst the policy of selling local authority housing has further depleted the stock available for rent. This shortfall has not been made up by the private rented sector, although in some locations this represents a neglected aspect of rural housing supply.