Council buys up more social homes at Ponders End estate redevelopment

It comes amid financial struggles for the developer behind the ongoing Alma Estate scheme, reports Joe Ives, Local Democracy Reporter

Hundreds of homes have already been built at Alma Estate, with more planned — Hundreds of homes have already been built at Alma Estate, with many more planned

Enfield Council has agreed to buy 47 homes from the troubled developer behind a regeneration scheme in Ponders End.

According to the local authority, the move to buy the social rent properties at the Alma Estate redevelopment comes in response to a “challenging national development environment” and a risk of delay to the project’s completion.

This environment has been especially tricky for housebuilding giant Vistry, which continues to develop hundreds of new homes on the estate adjacent to Ponders End Station.

Shares in the company, listed as Vistry Group PLC on the London Stock Exchange, have fallen almost 80% in the past two years. In June, the company announced it was expecting a £30million pre-tax loss in the first half of 2026 alone.

The council says that buying the 47 homes from the struggling company will “demonstrate the ability of the council and Vistry Partnerships to work collaboratively to unlock delivery, maintain momentum and ensure completion of a strategically important regeneration project”.

It follows another agreement, reached in March this year, for the council to buy 46 affordable homes being built on the estate by Vistry.

The deal means the council will own a total of 93 homes on ‘phase 2B’ of the project, set to be one of the “final stages” of a redevelopment scheme that began over a decade ago. The homes will range from one to five-bedrooms in size.

The final redevelopment phases will involve demolishing the last one of Alma Estate’s original four landmark tower blocks, and will see 723 new homes built in total following planning permission being granted last year.

These will bring the total number of new homes built in the area to 1,402, with 32% designated as affordable homes. This nearly doubles the density of the original Alma Estate.

In a decision report, the council said that agreeing to buy the remaining affordable properties within phase 2b will provide “a secure purchaser for these homes, strengthen delivery confidence and support the viability of the wider scheme”.

The local authority also warned that failing to agree new terms with Vistry would risk delays to the project as well as potentially negative “reputational consequences for both parties”.

The deal is set to be funded “through a combination” of a Greater London Authority’s affordable housing grant and the council’s own housing budget. The council has not yet published information about the expected cost of its acquisition, however.

It was back in 2014 that the council entered into a development agreement with Countryside Properties – later acquired by Vistry – for a “comprehensive estate renewal programme” at Alma.

But the development agreement has already been amended three times. The local authority says the latest “supplemental agreement” is, like the ones that preceded it, being devised to “respond to changing market conditions, viability pressures and evolving delivery requirements”.

In March 2025, the council’s planning committee agreed to plans to build an additional 322 homes at Alma Estate, taking the total number of homes envisaged for the scheme to 1,402 – a tally 70% higher than had been granted by the original application, approved in 2017.

Then, in December last year, the council agreed to a revised planning permission for the scheme, providing an “approved framework for delivery of the remaining development phases”.

Phase 2B is reportedly on track to deliver 723 homes, three-quarters of which will be for private sale. The remaining 187 properties are set to be designated as ‘affordable’ with 107 for shared ownership homes and 80 for social rent.

According to the council, the latest purchase deal “represents a critical milestone” that will help provide timely delivery of the scheme and “serve identified housing need within the borough”.

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