About Us

Great homes, positive people, strong communities

Origin Housing is a housing association with over 80 years’ experience of providing quality, affordable rented homes and services.  We have over 10,000 beneficiaries including those who live in our retirement schemes and  care homes, as well as those in our general-needs housing.

Within Origin Housing, the community development team delivers a range of community development activities designed to improve the lives of our residents and their communities.  Our work is currently focussed on 4 main areas:

       
Developing leaders

Our aim is to support young people and adults to develop as community leaders, so that they can make positive changes in their own communities. We do this by providing training and opportunities to develop projects and to volunteer within their communities, thus promoting positive community action. Much of this work is be targeted towards young people at risk and also those involved in anti-social behaviour.

Strengthening Communities

We aim to strengthen communities in a number of ways, including providing advice, mentoring, developing skills and access to funding, in addition to directly organising some projects.  We encourage and support initiatives that bring people together, to share their skills, knowledge and resources, as they aim to address community needs.

 

Managing Money

“Managing Money” is about supporting residents to mange their money more effectively by helping communities gain access to affordable financial services, such as banking and loans.  It is also about providing advice and guidance to enable people to make smart choices, thus helping them to protect their tenancies, manage their household finances, access benefits, maximise income and ultimately to safeguard themselves and their families against the stresses and pressures of financial exclusion.

Supporting Employment and Training

The Employment and Training theme is about providing training and work-experience opportunities to help people into employment.  Such support is wide ranging and includes training courses, college placements, CV-writing, job-searching, interview techniques, volunteering opportunities and paid work placements.

 

In addition to these four key priorities, the health and wellbeing of our residents and their communities is also very important to us.  Throughout our various projects and initiatives we therefore aim to support people to access the best health services and opportunities available.