BBC Scotland News
A housing association in the Borders is converting garages into homes in a bid to ease the current crisis.
Scottish Borders Housing Association (SBHA) has created seven luxury bungalows have been created in Jedburgh from rows of derelict lock-ups, with a further six nearing completion in neighbouring Hawick.
Their first tenant, Jeanette Elliot, had been housebound for almost five years, due to access stairs, before moving into her new home this month.
She is the first social housing tenant of a former garage anywhere in Scotland.
She said: “This is ideal – it has made such a difference to my life in such a short space of time.
“The kitchen is great and the wet room is fantastic, but the main thing for me is that it is all on one level.
“You would never know that this used to be a block of garages.”
SBHA has around 6,500 people registered on its waiting lists.
It receives around 50 bids for every flat and house that becomes available.
As well as taking over the local authority’s housing stock of 6,700 properties in 2003, it also inherited close to 800 garages.
With modern vehicles having better security, being more weather resistant, and, in some cases being too large for traditional lock-ups, most of the garages are now empty.
Julia Mulloy, chief executive of SBHA, said: “The garages were built a long time ago and are mostly no longer in use, so we began looking for alternative uses for the space they take up.
“We discovered this idea for making homes from the garage structures, and we began looking at a few examples in England where the conversions had taken place.
“We felt that it would work well within our communities.”
SBHA employed the services of specialist builders HUSK to construct the new homes using the shells of the garage blocks.
The surprisingly spacious one and two-bedroom bungalows feature air source heat pumps, solar panels, a fire suppression system and vehicle charging points.
All properties are also fully accessible for wheelchair users with level entrances and adapted shower rooms.
Russell Edwards from HUSK said: “The garages-to-homes model allows us to reuse existing structures in a sustainable way, providing high-quality living spaces while reducing waste and construction time.”
Scottish Borders Council declared a housing emergency in May, 2024 – just days before a similar declaration was made by the government at Holyrood.
A number of initiatives have been accelerated, including bringing empty homes back into use and buying flats from the open market, to compliment housebuilding efforts by social housing providers in the area.
Donna Bogdanovic, the council’s head of housing strategy and development, has welcomed the garages-to-homes scheme.
She said: “We are having double the number of bids for social housing when it becomes available, and our homeless service is under a lot of pressure.
“This highlights the need for alternative strategies so we don’t just address homelessness but we are able to offer long-term, stable housing options that people desperately need.
“Every little helps, and what SBHA and HUSK have done here is taking something that has relatively little value and transforming it into something special.”
With the first phase of the garage-to-homes project almost complete, bosses at SBHA are already assessing further rows of unused garages across the Borders to create more accessible bungalows.
The current construction time for each development is just under a year, but it is hoped this time will shorten as further phases are brought forward.