The ownership of 1,800 homes on the iconic Grade II* listed Byker Estate formally transferred from Byker Community Trust (BCT) to Karbon Homes today, 1 April 2021.
The transfer will bring new and accelerated investment into the Estate between 2021 to 2029, delivering better value for money and helping to achieve the priorities that BCT customers said were important to them.
The management area will continue to be called Byker Community Trust, the local office and team will remain in situ and all of the housing services in Byker will continue to be delivered by Karbon.
Michelle Bell has been appointed as Assistant Director – Byker Community. Michelle will be responsible for managing the Byker Estate and ensuring the commitments of the transfer and what customers have asked for are delivered.
As part of the wide consultation for the transfer, a Community Pledge was developed which outlines what will be delivered, based on the priorities that customers said were important to them. This included transformational investment across the environment, additional funding to modernise homes and building new homes to meet the needs of existing and future customers. More detail on the Community Pledge can be found here.
Paul Fiddaman, Chief Executive of Karbon Homes, said:
“I am pleased to welcome Byker Community Trust into the Karbon family.
“Whilst we already have some strong working relationships in the area, we are keen to build on the excellent work of BCT and learn from its award winning, community-led approach. At Karbon, we are very focused on the individual communities we serve and taking a local and estate-led approach is a valuable model that works incredibly well in Byker. We will be gaining new insights, skills and experience from the BCT team and we are excited to have them join us and help us in our ambitions to provide customers with a strong foundation for life.”
Byker customers should continue to make payments and enquiries in the same way and all contact details remain unchanged.