Mears announces £57m of social housing repair contracts

Social housing contractor Mears has announced £57m of new repair contracts with housing providers in Watford, Northumberland and west London.

The largest contract is with Watford Community Housing Trust, which has made Mears one of two partners in a five-year Decent Homes partnership. The contract, worth around £33m to Mears, includes replacement of kitchens and bathrooms and external upgrading works.

The housing trust has also appointed Mears as a partner on an innovative framework arrangement for capital works and maintenance, set up as a central purchasing body, to enable other social landlords to purchase similar services.

Castle Morpeth Housing in Northumberland has contracted Mears to join other partners in delivering a £32m works, improvement and repair programme on its recently transferred housing stock. The contract, initially for four years, is worth £12m to Mears.

The third contract announced, also worth £12m over four years, is with Mears' existing customer Catalyst Communities Housing Association, based in west London. Mears is to provide voids and major cyclical maintenance repairs services for the association's housing stock.

Bob Holt, chief executive of Mears Group, said: “These new wins by our social housing division add additional important contracts to our order book, which is at record levels, and we believe that Mears is in a very strong position to benefit further from our current bid pipeline.”