Former bank building in Leominster to be used for social housing

A prominent building in a Herefordshire town is poised to be used for social housing.

Permission was granted in 2023 to convert the top floor of the Buttercross building in Broad Street, Leominster, formerly the town’s library and until 2018 home to a Barclays bank branch, into four self-contained flats.

Now Herefordshire Council has revealed that it bought up the building last November, with money from a £5 million fund intended to “meet the county’s urgent need for provision, provide better homes for those in need and reduce dependency on high-cost temporary accommodation”.

Cabinet member for finance Coun Pete Stoddart said the council was also “finalising acquisition” of a building in Hereford for the same use.

The funding, which the council has borrowed, will be repaid “through income from housing benefit and the reduced cost of temporary accommodation”, he said, adding that the council would consider borrowing more for this purpose, “should other opportunities come forward”.

The council is keen to find ways to cut its bill for providing temporary housing for those at risk of homelessness in the county, which it is obliged to do.

In the year to last April it spent more than £3.4 million on such accommodation, mostly in the form of budget hotels and B&Bs.

The county faces what the council called “a critical shortage of social housing”, with nearly two thousand households on its waiting list.

Though in a classical style and within the town’s conservation area, the Buttercross building is relatively modern and is not listed.

Plans submitted with the conversion proposal said each second-floor flat would cover 50-55 square metres, with a single bedroom, bathroom and open-plan kitchen and living space, all naturally lit from existing windows.