Bristol council homes being left empty for months

Over 400 houses are thought to be currently empty in Bristol

Council homes in Bristol are being left empty for an average of over three months before being let to new tenants, a report has said.

A backlog of repair work is being blamed for the long delays.

The number of households in temporary accommodation is 1,497 - three times as many as in 2018.

John Smith, a senior manager at Bristol City Council, said the diversion of resources to Barton House has not helped the situation.

The report made to the authority's scrutiny commission on 7 March says the target time for turning around council homes between tenancies is either 50 days or 70 days.

Yet it showed that between October to December last year, the average re-let time for council homes was 115 days, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).

The report said that there was a "concerted effort" to focus on long-term (one year) empty properties in 2024.

It said: "All long-term empty properties have been reviewed. Each now has an action plan in place and contractor capacity has been increased to undertake the work required.

"This means that average re-let times may stay high or even spike as these empty properties are brought back into use.

"However, as the backlog reduces, the average re-let time should start to decrease more rapidly after March."

'More progress'

Almost 400 council homes are estimated to be empty across Bristol at the moment.

Mr Smith, executive director of growth and regeneration at the city council, said some progress had been made.

Mr Smith said: "The diversion of a lot of resources to Barton House hasn't helped. We're hoping to make some more progress by the end of this quarter.

"We've put in additional resources in the repairs and maintenance team."