Employer housing support Strategic HR
For a lot of
workers a
pension
isn’t the
biggest
priority
facing them;
housing is
“Traditionally benefits have been
things like pensions and life insurance.
But these are no longer fitting the bill,”
he says. “For a lot of workers a pension
that they draw in 40 years isn’t the
biggest priority facing them here and
now; housing is.”
Which means a shift is taking place –
away from both traditional benefits and
fun office perks (free drinks and
yoga…) to offerings that make a
serious difference to employees’ lives.
“Housing is now very much front
and centre of conversations we’re
having in recruitment as we’re
conscious that rent, mortgage
payments and travel are a big part of
living expenses and that it’s affecting
what benefits people are looking for
when they’re deciding whether they
want to work somewhere or not,”
says Adams.
Return to the model village
Employer housing support isn’t a novel
concept though. It was 1879 when
George Cadbury created his Bournville
chocolate factory workers. Shops, parks
and recreation facilities were all on
site, taking the idea of the workplace
being a home from home to another
level. Dubbed ‘one of the nicest places
to live in Britain’, it became a blueprint
for others.
In the Army housing is provided for
the families of military personnel at or
near their duty station. Then there’s the
travel and tourism sector, where it’s
fairly common for organisations to
supply group housing for reps working
overseas in resorts.
Across the pond Silicon Valley
heavyweights Facebook and Google are
building campuses of homes near their
HQs to cater for the wave of techies
flocking to the San Francisco Bay Area
for work only to find the number of
affordable homes doesn’t match the
number of jobs.
So are we about to see a return to the
age of the Victorian model village? For
director of policy and campaigns at the
Recruitment & Employment
Confederation (REC) Tom Hadley
questions hang over whether such an
approach can work now that a job for
life is a thing of the past.
“I’m not sure it can work today as
there’s fluidity in the job market, and
people spending their career working
for one employer isn’t as prevalent,” he
explains. “Big companies like to create a
campus feel to workplaces but I think a
return to the old Cadbury model is a
bit of a step removed from today.”
However, there are more nuanced
ways employers can provide housing
benefits. Companies including Grant
Thornton and the London Fire Brigade
were among the first to sign the
Employer Housing Pledge back in
2017, part of London First and the
mayor of London’s wider Fifty
Thousand Homes campaign to increase
housebuilding in the capital. Under the
pledge employers commit to help staff
with the cost of housing through
initiatives such as flexible working and
rental deposit loans.
A foot up
For Shalam HR’s position on the
housing crisis can be threefold: to
supply new homes by teaming up with
build-to-rent landlords to offer private
rented properties for employees;
supporting vulnerable homeless people
into homes as part of training or
employment opportunities; and giving
staff access to existing homes by
helping with upfront costs via schemes
such as rental deposit loans.
The latter is the area Shalam
describes as both the “most effective”
and “one of the simplest” for HR to
roll out.
Starbucks has run its rental deposit
loan scheme Home Sweet Loan for four
years. Partners (employees) can apply
for an interest-free loan of up to one
month’s salary to pay for the deposit
when they move into a property.
Similar to a travel loan, payments are
then deducted from the individual’s
pay packet each month over the next
12 months.
Russell Butcher, senior manager in
the partner resources team at
Starbucks, explains that the scheme
came directly out of employee feedback
that housing – and specifically
stumping up a deposit (which often
amounts to five weeks’ rent) – posed a
particular “pain point”.
“Some of our partners were turning
to payday loan sharks with high interest
rates,” he says. “A large proportion of
our stores are based in cities and about
70% of our retail workforce are under
30. This is Generation Rent – they’re a
long way off owning a property so the
reality of moving and a rental deposit
is stressful.”
Butcher shares one particularly
moving anecdote. “I remember
phoning one of the first partners on the
scheme to ask for feedback and he told
me his family had been at risk of being
made homeless, so he’d really needed
that cash quickly to secure a new
property,” he says. “We shouldn’t
underestimate how offering a rental
deposit and reducing stress in these
scenarios can make a big difference.”
Beyond renting, there’s also
mortgage deposit assistance and
mortgage repayment schemes. “We
have flexible benefits, which means our
head office partners can allocate a
percentage of their salaries to a pot of
funding that they can choose to spend
on a number of areas; like topping up
their pension or for high-street
‘model village’ to provide decent,
affordable rental housing for his
Illustration: Dan@KJA artist
hrmagazine.co.uk October 2019 HR 33
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