One of Home REIT’s largest tenants has spoken out about what they believe are fundamental flaws at the heart of the business.
Matt Fearnley, chief executive at Noble Tree Foundation, explained why he had withheld almost £1m in rent from the REIT, saying that Home owed more than £3.2m for repairs and insurance that has not been forthcoming.
“The model hasn’t worked for the tenants,” said Fearnley, whose charity manages 421 homes with 1,013 beds in Northampton, Newcastle, Birmingham, Coventry, Wolverhampton and London.
“We have been promised an amount of money that has not been delivered. We pay for refurbishments as best as we can, but we cannot pay for everything. Tenants are living in substandard accommodation.”
Home REIT was established in 2020 as the first London-listed property fund tackling homelessness, and had ambitions to grow into a £1bn fund and take 10,000 homeless people off the streets.
From the archive: Home REIT on using private capital for public good
Now it has become mired in a crisis over rent arrears and attacks by short sellers including Viceroy Research, leading to a crash in its share price.
Home REIT’s biggest tenant, Liverpool-based Big Help Group, has also stopped paying rent, along with another major tenant, Wolverhampton-based Lotus Sanctuary.
