The multi-billion pound commitment to 400,000 new homes in Britain over the next five years announced by Chancellor George Osborne in his Autumn Statement.

The main pledges are:

• to double the housing budget to £2bn per year
• to build 200,000 homes for first-time buyers under the Starter Home Initiative
• to build 135,000 new homes under a new Help to Buy Shared Ownership scheme with relaxed eligibility criteria
• to introduce a Help to Buy London scheme to grant equity loans of up to 40% to buyers of new homes in the capital
• to charge buy-to-let purchasers a stamp duty (SDLT) rate 3% above owner-occupiers (applicable from April 2016), to be re-invested back into local communities

For key announcements in the Spending Review and Autumn Statement 2015 read here.