Anchor Hanover Group

3 December 2025

Anchor Trading Statement for six months to 30 September 2025

Unaudited trading update for the six months to 30 September 2025 for Anchor Hanover Group, trading as Anchor

Anchor, England's largest provider of specialist housing and care for people in later life, with more than 65,000 residents in almost 55,000 homes, announces its trading highlights and unaudited financial results for the first half of the 2025/26 financial year.

Highlights

·    Turnover was £357.1m (September 2024: £332.5m), a 7.4% increase driven by inflationary increases to rents, service charges and care fees, together with increased property sales volumes.

·    Operating margin was 7.6% (September 2024: 9.3%) principally due to the cost of holding unsold properties and higher depreciation charges. 

·    Net surplus was £8.2m (September 2024: £13.4m), a 38.8% decrease arising from the decline in operating margin together with an increase in net interest as we continue to utilise available cash and loans to increase our provision of affordable and energy-efficient homes for people in later life.

·    EBITDA was £63.4m (September 2024: £64.7m), a 2.0% decrease mainly due to costs associated with holding unsold properties.

·    EBITDA MRI was £32.7m (September 2024: £39.9m), an 18.0% decrease, driven by lower EBITDA and investment in capital works to existing properties of £30.7m.

·    Interest cover on an EBITDA basis was 3.4x (September 2024: 3.7x) and on an EBITDA MRI basis was 1.7x (September 2024: 2.3x).

·    Gearing stood at 31.6% (September 2024: 29.9%), remaining comparatively low for the social housing sector.

·    Undrawn facilities and cash of £177.4m (September 2024: £275.5m) provide substantial liquidity.

·    Credit rating - In July 2025, S&P revised Anchor's rating from A+ (stable) to A+ (negative) following a regulatory downgrade. This change in rating outlook reflects S&P's view that there is a degree of uncertainty about Anchor's cost base and the potential for increased investment in its housing stock.

In summer 2025, Anchor was downgraded by the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) from G1 to G3 for Governance and issued a C3 grading for its performance against the RSH Consumer Standards.  Anchor retained a V1 grading for financial viability.   Our Regulatory Compliance Improvement Plan was agreed with the Regulator of Social Housing in October 2025, on which we continue to deliver at pace.   

The corporate plan remains unchanged and continues to focus on the four key themes - the 'Four Mores' - of being more efficient; delivering more and better homes; creating more opportunities for colleagues; and being more influential on behalf of older people.

Last year, we launched our Care Strategy, which prioritises the continued provision of high-quality care and long-term financial sustainability. Initial actions under this strategy have concentrated on managing staff costs, resulting in significant year-on-year reductions in the use of agency staff. We are currently focusing on staffing structures and occupancy levels in our homes.

Summary financial performance for the 6 months ended 30 September 2025  

Operational highlights

Whilst underlying financial performance remains stable our operating margin has declined to 7.6% (September 2024: 9.3%).  Housing income is up due to rent increases and in Care, revenues increased due to higher fees and a small increase in occupied beds. Operating costs have increased mainly because of inflation, increased depreciation charges (reflecting investment in both existing and new stock) and the cost of holding unsold stock. One-off regulatory compliance costs of £0.5m have been incurred arising from the downgrade, including legal, advisory and resource costs, as we worked to establish and agree a Regulatory Compliance Improvement Plan.

EBITDA MRI to September 2025 is £32.7m (September 2024: £39.9m). In the 2025 period we had increased levels of capitalised major repairs (MRI) compared to 2024, at £30.7m compared with £24.8m for the six months to September 2024.

Care home occupancy for the month of September was 89.4%, compared with 89.3% in March 2025, which is in line with the sector average and has followed the sector trend. Housing occupancy has declined from 98.7% at the end of March 2025 to 98.2% at the end of September, demand remains high but there has been an increase in the time taken to get void works turned around.

There have been 40 property sales in the period, compared to 23 last year.  After deducting the cost of holding unsold properties there is a net deficit from property sales. Demand for recently built stock remains good, while we are facing challenges on some larger legacy developments.  

Acquisitions and development

Anchor currently has a programme of 2,232 homes (1,522 social or affordable rent, 552 shared ownership, and 158 private sale), of which:

•    731 have been approved but are not yet committed

•    819 homes are committed and/or on-site.

•    682 homes have reached completion and are available for sale or rent. Of these, 120 have been sold.

Our core aim is to deliver an average of at least 500 new homes per year over a rolling 10-year period. The programme will be split with an approximate mix of 70% for social or affordable rent and up to 30% of older peoples shared ownership (OPSO) homes. Our developments will mostly be mixed tenure independent living schemes, predominantly apartments for older people with a local mix of low rent and shared ownership homes.

Our new homes will be environmentally sustainable, meeting a minimum average SAP rating of 87 and increasing in line with our Environmental Sustainability and Net Zero Carbon Strategy to achieve net zero readiness by 2050.

During the first six months of the year, we invested £66.2m (September 2024: £46.7m) in developing new homes and we expect to meet internal targets for practical completions by the year end.

Investment in existing properties

We have invested £30.7m (September 2024: £24.8m) in capital works to existing properties.

Retrofitting plays a key role in Anchor's pathway to Net Zero by 2050. We want all our homes to remain warm, comfortable and affordable for residents as we work towards the government's goal for all rented homes to achieve an EPC rating of C or above by 2030.

During the first half of the year, we have completed 30 retrofits, bringing our total to 324 homes receiving energy efficiency upgrades. For this work we were pleased to leverage £2.2m of grant funding contributions under the Social Housing Decarbonisation Funding (SHDF) wave 2.1, match-funded by Anchor.

Treasury and financing

In the first six months of the year £55m has been drawn down from the syndicated revolving credit facility. This takes the total drawings to £160m as we continue to increase our provision of affordable and energy-efficient homes for people in later life. Liquidity headroom has decreased but overall remains strong with undrawn available loan facilities and cash of £177.4m (March 2025: £239.4m).

Anchor maintains in excess of 110% of required asset cover on its secured loans and has unencumbered stock of c. £1.8bn. The retained bond capacity of £100m nominal value and £25m of undrawn shelf facility with Sunlife Capital Management ensure we remain well-positioned to deliver on our strategic objectives.

Of Anchor's total debt portfolio 60% was fixed at the end of September by way of either specific fixed rate instruments or a standalone interest rate swap (March 2025: 63%).

We have generated a cash inflow of £68.4m from our operations during the first half of the financial year. After £108.7m of investment in existing properties, IT infrastructure through our Connected Properties initiative and the construction of new social rental and shared ownership properties there has been a cash outflow before financing of £40.3m. 

Residents and colleagues

Our residents' safety and trust are paramount. Our focus remains on delivering safe, high-quality homes and services and ensuring necessary improvements in landlord health and safety continue at pace. 

To continue to improve the way in which we listen to residents, we appointed Anchor resident Heather Rowell to the Board in August 2025. Heather will help further ensure we take resident views, needs and ambitions into account in strategic decision making.

Our partnership continues with specialist connectivity provider, Wifinity, providing Wi-Fi across the majority of our locations and investing in Wi-Fi infrastructure in offices and communal spaces. The project has won two awards: Best Technology-Enhanced Environment at the Retirement Living Awards 2025; and Best Use of Technology in Seniors Housing at the Health Investor Seniors Housing Awards 2025

We continue to provide a broad range of initiatives to support those who need it most. In the past six months our BeWise team has secured £6.4m (September 2024: £5.6m) for residents by way of access to additional benefits. We have ringfenced £0.3m in a hardship fund that supports residents with household bills. The issuance of vouchers under this scheme amounted to over £100k in this period.

We are a Real Living Wage employer which reflects our commitment to paying colleagues a fair wage for the job they do and also contributes to our workforce stability.  We are also proud to have the prestigious Gold status accreditation from Inclusive Employers for our approach to colleague diversity and inclusion. 

Thank you

The Board is pleased to present these half year results and is grateful to the many partners and stakeholders who work with us for the benefit of our residents.

Ken Youngman, Interim Chief Financial Officer

3 December 2025

Unaudited Financial Statements for the six months to September 2025

Comparatives are with Anchor's consolidated, audited year end results to 31 March 2025 and unaudited results for the six months ended September 2024.

1.     Group operating surplus including property proceeds, less amortisation of social housing grant, less Government capital grants taken to income, add back depreciation and impairment attributed to retirement housing to let and residential care homes, add back goodwill amortisation, less improvements to existing properties capitalised.

2.     EBITDA MRI including property proceeds, divided by interest and financing costs less interest receivable.

3.     Net debt divided by historical cost of completed properties.

Anchor Hanover Group                                

Derya Filiz

Head of External Communications

2 Godwin Street

Bradford

BD1 2ST

07713 085004

[email protected]

[email protected]