Huntingdonshire District Council is working on plans to try and bring empty homes in the area back into use
Homes being left to sit empty is “not natural” a councillor has said as plans have been set out on how to bring vacant homes back into use. Huntingdonshire District Council has published a draft empty homes strategy, setting out how it hopes to work with homeowners to bring empty properties back into use.
The authority said enabling empty homes to be lived in again is one of the ways housing stock in the area can be increased. Councillor Sam Wakeford (Labour), executive councillor for economy, regeneration and housing, said it is “challenging” to bring empty homes back into use, but that he hoped the draft plan would “significantly strengthen the council’s work”.
A report presented to an overview and scrutiny panel (performance and growth) meeting this week (January 21) said as of September 2025 there were 1,292 empty homes in Huntingdonshire, of which 491 had been empty for over six months.
A number of aims have been set out in the proposed new strategy on how the district council can tackle the issue of empty homes. The plan said the authority would “maintain accurate information on empty homes in the district”, so that it has an up-to-date record of where homes have been left empty.
It is proposed that the district council would initially offer homeowners “advice, assistance and guidance” to prevent a home from “becoming long term problematic empties” and to help bring them back into use.
The plan also proposed that the authority should “maximise income opportunities” from empty homes, including through council tax premiums, and that enforcement action could be carried out to try and bring an empty home back into use.
Councillor Stephen Ferguson (Independent), executive councillor for resident services and corporate performance, said empty homes were “not natural” and “each represented a missed opportunity to address homelessness”. He said the proposed strategy would see the council start by offering advice and practical support to help people overcome “genuine barriers” to bringing a home back into use.
However, Cllr Ferguson said “prolonged inaction has consequences” and that when engagement failed the district council should “act proportionately and in the public interest”.
Councillor Dr Marcus Pickering (Independent) said he thought the draft plan included some “really good ideas on how to bring empty homes back into use”. Councillor Simone Taylor (Independent) said this plan was “long awaited”, highlighting that empty properties left to fall into “wreck and ruin” impact people who have to live next door or nearby.
Council needs to be ‘extremely cautious’ in some empty home situations
However, Councillor Ian Gardener (Conservative) raised concerns that the authority could be effectively using a “sledgehammer” when it may not be necessary. He highlighted that the majority of the empty homes in Huntingdonshire had been vacant for less than six months.
He said a home could be empty for various reasons, including due to probate after someone has died. Cllr Gardener told the meeting that after his father had died it had taken them over a year to be able to sell the home, and said the authority needed to be “extremely cautious” when dealing with this type of situation.
Cllr Ferguson said he had been in this situation himself, and highlighted that the proposed first response would be to offer guidance and practical support. He said people who find themselves in the situation Cllr Gardener had described could feel “quite lonely”, and that the council could offer help to get the houses sold and back into use quicker.
Councillor Ross Martin (Conservative) said he was “broadly supportive of trying to get empty homes back into use”. However, he said he ‘drew the line’ at taking some of the enforcement action proposed, such as enforced sales, as he highlighted it was not illegal for someone to own a home and leave it empty.
Cllr Wakeford said they were not proposed to take enforcement action “routinely or to any significant degree”, but suggested there could be circumstances where a home has become a “blight to its communities” and the authority would need to consider using some enforcement action.
Officers added that in their opinion the plan would need to have a “carrot and stick”. A final version of the proposed strategy is due to be presented to cabinet for consideration at a later date.
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