Blackstone and Regis agree terms to acquire around 1,750 homes from Vistry

The first completions under the agreement are expected by the end of June 2024, with the majority of homes expected to be finished within the next two years.

Blackstone Real Estate and Regis Group are also the investors behind Sage Homes, the for-profit registered provider.

In November last year, Sage Homes and Leaf Living agreed a £819m deal with Vistry to acquire 2,915 homes being delivered across 70 Vistry developments by the first quarter of 2027.

In July 2023, Sage Homes signed Vistry up as its first partner on Home Stepper, its new scheme aimed at driving up the take-up of shared ownership. Under this, Sage and Vistry will deliver around 800 shared ownership homes initially across the country.

James Seppala, head of European real estate at Blackstone, said: “Institutional private capital can play an important role in providing high-quality housing stock across the UK, particularly in the private rented sector, which is significantly undersupplied today.

“Partnerships such as these can meaningfully accelerate the delivery of new homes and help alleviate structural undersupply across the sector.”

Vistry said the homes in the acquisition with Blackstone and Regis would be pre-sold in line with its partnerships strategy of pre-selling around 65 per cent of all homes across the business.

This will help the group to reach its medium-term financial targets, the house builder added.

Greg Fitzgerald, chief executive of Vistry, said: “This agreement supports our differentiated business model, with the certainty provided by the pre-selling of homes enabling us to accelerate our build programmes, guarantee work for our supply chain, reduce sales and build costs and create vibrant new communities. 

“This year we are on track to deliver more than a 10 per cent increase in new-home completions, playing a key part in helping to address the UK’s acute housing shortage.”