Scotland’s leading property conference opens up funding debate

Housing industry professionals are being urged to attend Scotland’s leading property conference: ‘21st Century Homes in Scotland: Accessing Funding and Leveraging Private Finance’, which is being held in Edinburgh on 23 August 2011.

Hosted by leading Edinburgh-based law firm Maclay, Murray & Spens, and organised by the respected Waterfront Conference Company, the event will bring together a range of experts from across the private and public sectors to address the new challenges of funding affordable housing in Scotland.

Topics of the day will debate the best way forward in trying to access funding and how to leverage private finance in order to deliver enough affordable new homes, as set out within the Scottish Government’s recent housing action plan*.

The Government’s ambitious strategy essentially aims to deliver more homes for less over the next 10-years. However, this goal, combined with Scotland’s growing and ageing population, and the decline in the number of new homes being built by the public and private housing sectors in recent years presents the industry with an unprecedented task.

Aimed at those with a vested interest in housing, this event will attract housing associations, private developers, local authorities, investors, planning consultants, academics, architects and mortgage lenders. Attendees will be able to get up to speed on new models of funding, explore new ways to manage development in the current economic climate and debate how to break the deadlock within the first time buyer market.

Bill Barron from the Scottish Government is looking forward to speaking at this year’s event, he says: “This is the third consecutive annual housing conference in recent years. With the previous events being very well received, the conference has quickly established itself as a key place for those from within the industry to come together to address issues and develop solutions.”

“If we are successfully going to deliver Scotland’s future housing needs, then it is imperative that we work cohesively and the conference provides a platform to enable us to do this.”

The conference is scheduled to run from 8.45am to 4.45pm on Tuesday 23 August at Maclay, Murray & Spens office, 15 Lauriston Place, Edinburgh, EH3 9EP. For further information, or to register for the conference, visit thewaterfront.co.uk.