History

Who are we?

  • Soha Housing is a charitable organisation that owns and manages 5,500 homes.
  • We provide homes for affordable rent, shared ownership and sale.
  • We have an annual turnover of £31m.
  • We are managed by a Board of 12 members, including 4 tenants. The current chair of our Board is a tenant.
  • We were the first housing association to get three star equivalent in Resident Involvement and Value for Money in our Short Notice Inspection carried out by the Audit Commission.

Building new homes

  • Development programme which will build 160 new homes in 2011/12.
  • We develop in Oxford City, South Oxfordshire, Swindon, Vale of White Horse, West Oxfordshire, High Wycombe and Cotswold District.
  • Our development programme is a partner of the Bromford Housing Partnership, one of the largest providers of affordable housing in the country.
  • We develop homes in partnership with the Oxfordshire Rural Housing Partnership.
  • We built the first ‘super’ energy efficient homes in South Oxfordshire.
  • We have experience of rural regeneration, with the demolition and rebuild of over 60 homes.
  • We provide a range of supported accommodation and work with South Oxfordshire District Council to tackle homelessness.

Improving homes and communities

  • We have achieved our highest level of resident satisfaction ever at 91%.
  • We invest over £5.1m per annum in planned maintenance.
  • We have invested over £56m in the last 12 years on our existing stock.
  • We met the Government’s Decent Homes standard two years early.
  • We have a track record of regeneration based on grass roots community involvement in our estates.

Innovation

  • Winner of the Oxfordshire Business Awards for Customer Care 2005 and 2008.
  • Winner of the Didcot First Business and Community Award for Customer Care in 2009.
  • Set up a social enterprise which now manages 10% of Soha’s homes through a contract. The Berinsfield Community Business employs 90% of staff locally.
  • Winner of two Innovation grants from the Housing Corporation to develop the capacity of the community.
  • Winner of “feelthedifference.org.uk” award for our Impact Report 2009.
  • Selected by the Tenant Services Authority as a national Co-regulatory Champion for our resident led approach to governance in 2011.
  • Finalist for the Institute of Customer Services Awards Best Customer Satisfaction Strategy in 2011.
  • Finalist for the Housing Heroes Awards for Frontline Housing Team in 2011.

Improving Customer Services

  • 78% of tenants say we ‘take their views into account’.
  • 86% of tenants say they are satisfied with the repairs service.
  • Innovation in resident involvement, including a 15 point ‘Menu of Involvement’.
  • Track record of devolving budgets to be decided by residents.
  • Track record of resident involvement in all service areas.
  • Supporting Soha tenants to run a major national conference on how Soha tenants make a difference.

How good are we?

  • The ‘short notice inspection’ by the Audit Commission in November 2009 which awarded us top marks for Value for Money and Resident Involvement made us the first housing association in the country to achieve this.
  • We achieved four ‘green’ lights from the regulator.
  • We have very good Key Performance Indicators in arrears, tenant satisfaction, decent homes compliance and SAP rating.
  • We regularly publish details of our performance as compared with other Associations for residents and other stakeholders.
  • Soha Housing is an Investor in People.