What is the Social Housing Innovation Fund and why does it matter?

In late October 2025, alongside new safety laws coming into force (such as Awaab’s Law), the UK Government rolled out a £1 million Social Housing Innovation Fund. At first glance, it’s just another grant pot, but it signals a much bigger shift in how social landlords engage with their tenants. 

This fund is all about empowering tenant voices and creating new ways for residents to influence the services and decisions that affect their homes.

This blog outlines what the fund is, and why housing association comms teams, executives, and engagement leads should take note.

The Social Housing Innovation Fund (SHIF) is a government grant programme providing up to £1 million to support innovative projects that improve how social housing tenants engage with their landlords. This includes using tools to help reach those residents. Individual projects can bid for grants up to £100,000 each. 

The bidding opened on 27 October 2025 and closes on 9 January 2026, with funding awards expected in February. In other words, there’s a short window to get proposals in for those who want to take advantage.

The fund is open to a range of organisations in the social housing sector, including:

• Social landlords e.g. local authority or housing association providers
• Tenant-led groups e.g. formal or informal tenant organisations
• Tenant Management Organisations (TMOs) and Arms-Length Management Orgs (ALMOs)
• A mixture of the above (partnerships are encouraged)

One important requirement is that any project must be co-produced with tenants from the start.

Tenants should be active partners in designing and delivering the idea, not just consulted afterwards. Bids must demonstrate that tenants helped set the project’s vision and priorities. 

The main thing the fund is looking for is innovation. That means proposals should challenge current engagement practices and introduce new or significantly improved approaches or technologies. 

The idea is to test fresh ideas that could be used widely across the housing sector if successful. You can’t use this money for something you were already going to do anyway, it must add new value or scale up a promising concept.

Anything that gives tenants a stronger voice or improves the landlord-tenant relationship is up for grabs, and it’s important to note that underrepresented voices are a priority.

From ways to impact communities and improve living conditions, to funding platforms that prioritise community engagement, this is a great opportunity to do the things you’ve always wanted to do for your residents. 

The fund explicitly seeks projects that involve tenants who often aren’t heard. For instance, minority ethnic residents, disabled tenants, and young people. They want to ensure their feedback is listened to and acted upon and projects that find creative ways to include these voices stand a strong chance.

The programme welcomes consortium bids. This means that the lead bidder must be an eligible social housing or tenant body, but they can team up with partners or consultants.

This is a great opportunity for housing associations to bring in new expertise, for example through community engagement tools (like Orlo),  to make sure their idea really succeeds and gets the funding they need. 

You might be thinking, ‘tenant involvement isn’t new, why all the fuss now?’

The launch of this fund comes at an important moment for social housing in the UK, as the sector faces a wave of reforms focusing on tenant rights, safety, and voice. 

In fact, the week this fund opened, ‘Awaab’s Law’ came into force, imposing strict requirements on landlords to fix serious health hazards like damp and mould within tight timescales. 

The UK Government’s message is clear: business as usual is not acceptable. 

In July 2025, ministers unveiled a broader ‘Decade of Renewal’ plan for social housing, and it wasn’t just about bricks and mortar. Included in this plan there’s:

• Funding for 180,000 new social homes alongside new measures to boost transparency and tenant rights.
• New rules which include the Social Tenant Access to Information Requirements (STAIRs), giving tenants a right to information, and a new competence standard for staff.
• Heightened scrutiny of housing associations. Tenant engagement is now a ‘must-have,’ driven by new tenant satisfaction measures. Feeling listened to is the strongest driver of overall tenant satisfaction.

For communications and engagement leads in housing associations, the Social Housing Innovation Fund is more than just a grant opportunity, it’s a chance to push forward the projects you’ve always wished you had backing for. Many comms teams have great ideas to improve the tenant experience, but struggle to get internal funding or buy-in. And now’s your chance!

Here are our top tips for those considering an application: 

Start with your tenants:

• Identify a real problem or gap in the tenant experience (e.g. poor communication on repairs).
• Co-design the solution with tenants. Stronger tenant involvement makes for a better project.
• Remember: If your communications aren’t co-created, you risk being out of touch.

Be bold and creative:

• Propose something new. The UK Government wants to see innovative thinking.
• Look to other sectors (local government, for example) on how they’re involving their communities from the start..
• Take inspiration from other social housing authorities who are doing community engagement well. 

Focus on sustainability and scalability: 

• Explain how you will evaluate the effectiveness of your idea.
• Demonstrate how the project could be replicated by others and create insights for the entire housing sector.

Use a community engagement platform:

• Use a community engagement platform, like Orlo, to ensure that every single voice of your community is heard. 

So who is already listening and acting upon their tenants’ needs? 

Orlo customer, Valleys to Coast, a not-for-profit housing association in South Wales, are a great example. They’ve started to rethink how they communicate with and learn from their tenants which is exactly the kind of innovation the fund is looking to support.

At Orlo’s BIG Social 2025 in October 2025, Valleys to Coast’s comms team shared how they moved from one-way broadcasting to authentic two-way conversations with residents by asking one simple question of themselves: ‘So what?’.

Rather than just pushing out housing news and updates, they now constantly challenge their content and initiatives by asking ‘So what does this achieve for the people we serve?’.

In short, they have ensured that their communications and engagement always includes activity which: 

Calls for actionable feedback from residents: 

This led to initiatives like ‘Tell Us Tuesdays’, a weekly place for tenant feedback that directly informs organisational action.

Builds trust:

Staff close the feedback loop (acknowledge issue, fix it, report back), showing residents their voices lead to tangible results and increasing engagement.

Scales up: 

Valleys to Coast use Orlo to capture feedback at scale, analyse sentiment, and ensure all voices are heard, not just the loudest.

Has a positive impact: 

Results include more meaningful engagement, fewer ‘I didn’t know about this’ comments, and improved frontline staff morale.

Valleys to Coast have shown that true engagement starts with a simple cultural shift, such as involving tenants right from the start. Valleys to Coast also recently won an Orlo Spotlight Award for their brilliant community impact. Read more here.

If you’re inspired by the kind of tenant engagement innovation that Valleys to Coast has achieved and want to position your organisation for funding opportunities like the Social Housing Innovation Fund, now is the time to act.

Get in touch to discover how Orlo can help you create meaningful, scalable resident engagement that drives real impact, and strengthens your funding applications.