Torus Developments, a standalone division of Liverpool city region housing association Torus, reports record annual revenues of £140m with almost 600 new homes built. Tony McDonough reports
Torus Developments is reporting record annual revenues but says contractor solvency in a tough economic environment remains an ongoing issue.
A standalone division of Liverpool city region housing association Torus, the business has posted its annual accounts for the 12 months to March 31, 2025, on Companies House. They show a 30% surge in revenues to £140m.
However, pre-tax profits at the St Helens-based outfit fell from £1.16m last year to £868,000 in the latest year. Torus Developments employs just 52 people directly with much of the on-site work delivered by contractors.
During the fiscal the company completed 593 homes on behalf of its parent including those for social rent, affordable rent and with affordable home ownership options such as shared ownership and Rent to Buy as well as a number of homes for market sale.
This was a lower completion figure than the previous year when 875 new homes were built, a record number. During the most recent year Torus Developments started work on 851 new homes.
At year end it had 60 live schemes building 4,647 new homes. Of these, 20 are actively on site building 2,016 new homes.
Just over a year ago LBN reported that higher inflation leading to higher costs had an impact on the solvency of contractors employed by Torus Developments the company said this had proved to be the “biggest single challenge to delivery”.
As a consequence the housing association parent had taken a “pragmatic approach” and had offered assistance with cost inflationary pressures on fixed-price contracts. That policy has continued into the latest financial year with many contractors facing cost pressures.
Writing in the annual report, Torus Development chair Christine Fallon said delivery was affected by two main factors – cost inflation and high mortgage rates.
“The construction market risk issues were evidenced more by higher cost works than insolvencies,” she explained. Although she also said: “Contractor solvency remains a risk to delivery.”
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She added: “Torus taking a pragmatic approach to assisting with cost inflation pressures on fixed-price contracts, was welcomed by contractors and provided Torus with the greatest certainty of contractors’ ability to complete schemes in the future.”
The company said it had completed more than 50% of the sites affected by previous contractor failure. Four more sites are due to complete in 2025/26 with all due to complete by December 2026.
Christine also said: “The downturn seen in the outright sales market, through a steep rise in mortgage costs in the second half 2022/23 is still having an impact as mortgage rates have not reduced significantly since then. This affected the development of the sales programme in 2024/25.”
She concluded: “The company has ended the financial year in a position where risks are far more visible, better mitigated than before and the market has become more certain.”
Torus is a member of Liverpool City Region Housing Associations (LCRHA), a coalition of 23 housing associations. In December LCRHA told LBN it was ready to partner with Liverpool City Region Combined Authority to step up the delivery of new homes.