Preparing for Rural Housing Week 2024

Rural Housing Week is an annual campaign that highlights the many social and economic benefits of affordable housing to rural communities. Taking place 1-5 July, this year focuses on why rural communities need the next government to commit to a long-term plan for housing.

Affordable housing is essential to the prosperity of rural communities. It ensures people can afford to stay and work in their local area, which supports the rural economy. In fact, building just 10 affordable homes in a rural area can generate £1.4m and supports 26 jobs for local people. With the right conditions rural housing associations have the capability to significantly boost the economy and local communities- but what they need is a long-term plan for housing.

Despite the relatively low number of new homes needed to sustain a village, building new affordable homes in rural areas is extremely challenging. Complex planning policies, a shortage of investment and stretched resources is stunting development in rural areas and threatening the long-term prosperity of rural communities.

Rural Housing Week 2024 is our opportunity to raise awareness of some of the challenges rural communities face, how affordable housing helps, and how, with the right policy interventions, housing associations could be delivering much more of it. At the NHF, we’ll be publishing new resources and holding online events but to ensure Rural Housing Week has the greatest possible impact, we need your help.

Get involved

There are lots of ways you can support Rural Housing Week 2024:

• Save the date: 1-5 July 2024 and start spreading the word.
• Follow #RuralHousingWeek on Twitter/X and share the stories you find there.
• Prepare your own stories and share them during the week. These might include quotes, photos, videos, written case studies, a blog or a news article.
• Create and share your own Rural Housing Week supporter graphic.
• Use our template letter to invite your local representatives (MPs, mayors, councillors) to visit so they can see for themselves what your organisation does and the impact it has (doesn’t have to be during Rural Housing Week).
• With the general election taking place during Rural Housing Week, now is the perfect time to be speaking to your local candidates about the impact of the housing crisis in your rural area. To help with this, have a look at the political factsheets on our general election toolkit and try our local economic impact calculator.

I'm very much looking forward to all the creative ways you celebrate Rural Housing Week this year.