HBF to close Leeds office

The Home Builders Federation (HBF) will close its Leeds office at the end of the month, making at least two redundancies, Northern Housing understands.

It follows a gradual restructuring of its operations to reduce overall staff levels, as the catastrophic collapse in the housing market continues.

The principal trade body for housebuilders operates on a staff of 25. Its policy team is based in London and is supported by regional policy and planning teams in Wales, Leeds and Birmingham.

HBF members are responsible for around 80 per cent of new homes built every year.

A HBF spokesman told Northern Housing online that it was having to look at closing regional offices, as it was not immune from the current downturn in the housing market.

He said: "Our income stream is related to the state of the market so we are in a restructuring process at the moment."

He said it was too early to identify timescales of closures, but insisted the HBF would still retain its regional presence.

He added: "It's not a question of not having regional representation, but just how we do it. We're basically going to have to work on a smaller overall staff. We’ll have a regional remit and we’ll manage that primarily from London-based staff.”