Increase comes despite fall in shared ownership first tranche and market sales income due to ‘challenging’ market
Aster Group has reported an increase in its annual turnover and surplus.
The 38,000-home housing association, which operates across southern England, in its full audited results reported turnover of £337.6m for the year to 31 March 2026, up 2.3% on the £329.9m reported the previous year.
The group’s social housing lettings income rose 6.4% to £268.7. This was offset by a £6m drop in shared ownership first tranche sales income and a £2m fall in market sales.
It also generated significantly more income from asset sales this year including disposals. It generated £66.9m from asset sales, up from £45.8m the previous year with surplus from asset sales increasing by £11.8m to £37.9m.
The group disposed of 161 voids, up from 107 last year and increased its staircasing sales from 115 to 143.
It said: “These sales, including disposals, staircasing and other property transactions, provide additional capacity to reinvest in our existing homes and support delivery of new affordable housing for existing and future customers”.
The group reported a near quadrupling of its surplus from £11.7m to £45.3m. However the previous year’s figure was heavily impacted by £29m in one-off pension scheme cessation costs.
Aster’s completions remained at a similar level to last year with 978 homes built compared to 984 in 2024/25. It built fewer homes than it was hoping to.
Bjorn Howard, chief executive of Aster said: “The sales market remains challenging, and we’ve experienced delays in new homes being handed over due to factors outside of our control. This meant we delivered around 80 fewer homes than planned. While that’s frustrating, it doesn’t take away from the progress we’ve made or our determination to keep moving forward.”
The group increased its spend on improving existing stock from £115m to £124.6m
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