Lewisham to begin housing development in Lee Green next year

Lewisham Council have announced Hill as the contractor behind a forthcoming housing development in Lee Green.

The project will see 64 homes at Burnt Ash Hill. Plans for the site were covered back in 2023 on this site.

Despite Lewisham having around 3,000 households in temporary and emergency housing – often via private landlords at vast cost – a total of just 23 will be for social rent.

This isn’t the first Lewisham project with limited social housing on public land in a housing crises, with their Besson Street development in New Cross set to include zero social homes.

That site still hasn’t seen work commence around 20 years after residents were evicted, with demolition undertaken 18 years ago.

A pub on site was also knocked down. It’s a joint venture on public land with Grainger.

Cost pressures

Last year Lewisham stated a lack of social housing was causing vast cost increases with service cuts the result: “Our overspend for 2024/25 is now expected to be over £27m after using £9m of one-off measures” with “costs due a lack of social housing reaching £85m a year, up from £65m last year (an increase of 30%)”.

Since then the authority announced they would be seeking to increase work in partnership with private developers on further public sites despite a poor track record on plots such as Besson Street.

One such site announced was in Deptford where a public plot has long been vacant. The council announced plans to work with the private landowner next door through redeveloping both sites, then shortly afterwards plans went in to convert the building from offices to flats.

Earlier this year development was approved on another public site this time at Catford. Out of 113 homes just 39 are social housing.