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Working with members of the European Federation for Living (EFL), a European network of housing associations, companies and experts working to create more affordable, sustainable housing, RITTERWALD developed a framework to enable affordable housing organisations to demonstrate their Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) credentials to the rapidly increasing ESG investor market, the Certified Sustainable Housing Label (CSHL). A number of housing organisations have used the label to attract ESG oriented capital funding, including the Clarion Housing Group, the UKs largest Housing Association.

When the opportunity emerged to demonstrate the power of the Certified Sustainable Housing Label on film through a collaboration between Housing Europe and the BBC, highlighting innovation within, and the impact of, the social housing sector across Europe, RITTERWALD, Clarion Housing Group and the UK bank, NatWest, were keen to contribute.

The film highlights how Clarion utilised the Certified Sustainable Housing Label to issue £1bn of bonds and loans with the assistance of NatWest to support their social purpose activities. As well as managing 110,000 social and affordable homes and developing over 2,000 new homes a year, Clarion’s social purpose extends to Clarion Futures, a charitable foundation established to support its residents, develop their future, maximise the opportunities available to them and provide people with the tools and support they need to overcome their challenges. In doing so Clarion Futures aims to transform lives and communities for the better. This very much aligns with the ‘S’ in ESG, which sits alongside Clarions Sustainability Strategy, part of the E.

The film features a social housing tenant living in a new mixed tenure community who is successfully assisted by Clarion Futures to set up her own business. The film highlights both the importance of housing companies attracting their own sources of private capital, and therefore having less reliance on state funding, and how the objectives of social and affordable housing organisations can align with investor aspirations. The film is also a reminder of the ultimate beneficiaries of social and affordable housing, the tenants, and the contribution sub market housing makes to establishing well-functioning communities.

Explore more about #BuildingCommunities presented by Housing Europe here: www.buildinghousingcommunities.com

Housing Europe is the European Federation of Public, Cooperative & Social Housing. Since 1988 it's a network of 46 national & regional federations gathering 43.000 housing providers in 25 countries. Together they manage around 25 million homes, about 11% of existing dwellings in Europe.