Press release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 21 October 2025
Home@ix Responds to BBC Panorama: “Britain’s Housing Crisis Is About Affordability, Not Just Construction”
Following last night’s BBC Panorama programme, “The Race to Build 1.5 Million Homes,” Home@ix welcomes this renewed focus on solving the UK’s housing crisis — but warns that the debate remains one-sided.
“The issue isn’t how fast we can build,” said Steve Baker, former UK Government minister and CEO-designate of Home@ix. “It’s that decades of easy credit and speculation have made homes unaffordable. Unless we fix the demand-side distortions that drive up prices, building more homes alone won’t solve the problem.”
The Panorama episode featured a high-tech housing factory in Leicestershire, presenting Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) as the answer to meeting Labour’s 1.5-million-home target. Home@ix agrees that faster, factory-based construction is important but says the BBC missed the real story: financialisation.
“Developers can build more, but they don’t always sell more,” Baker added. “The absorption rate - how quickly new homes are released onto the market - is deliberately chosen to keep prices high. That’s not inefficiency; it’s a scandalous business model which harms homemakers”
Home@ix’s own research shows that the housing crisis is primarily one of affordability. Decades of cheap credit, mortgage liberalisation and widening intergenerational inequality, have turned homes from places to live into unattainable speculative assets. Even if Britain meets its construction targets, prices will stay out of reach for first-time homemakers unless demand-side reform accompanies supply-side expansion.
That reform, Baker argues, must include revisiting stamp duty for downsizers, curbing excessively cheap credit which fuels speculation and restoring the balance between public and private provision. “Help to Buy became ‘Help to Sell.’ We need policies that make homes affordable to own, not just profitable to trade,” he said.
Meanwhile, Home@ix is putting these ideas into practice. Following its October 2025 acquisition of Potton, the company is combining heritage design with modern factory-built methods to produce affordable, energy-efficient, and customisable homes.
At Home@ix, we’ve spent six years building a platform that brings together modern methods of construction, integrated home technology and a future-built finance model.
From Stylem@ix starter homes, to Superm@ix family designs and now Ultim@ix by Potton for premium customisable builds, we’re making sustainable homeownership truly accessible.
Looking ahead, we’re developing Moneym@ix - our forthcoming finance arm - designed to offer integrated mortgages, green finance and upgrade pathways. It will give customers a simpler, more transparent way to own and evolve their homes.
“The housing market is broken. Home@ix is here to fix it,” said CEO Designate Rt Hon Steve Baker FRSA. “With Potton’s heritage as our foundation and Home@ix as the tech engine, we’re setting a new standard for modern living.”
“Our goal is to show that modern manufacturing, smart finance, and social purpose can work together,” said Baker. “Britain doesn’t just need more homes. It needs homes that people can actually afford to live in.”
ENDS
Notes to Editors
Home@ix integrates modern methods of construction (MMC), design for manufacture and assembly (DfMA), and sustainable building practices to deliver affordable homes. Research references: Barker Review (2004); Lyons Housing Review (2014); Sir Oliver Letwin’s Independent Review of Build Out Rates (2018).
The Home@ix approach is mirrored by former Bank of England Governor and now Prime Minister of Canada Mark Carney with his Build Canada Homes policy. More information here:
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