Mid Sussex District Council has agreed to dispose of a former community centre and work with a housing association to replace it with affordable homes.
The decision regarding Swan Mead, in Queens Road, East Grinstead, was made during a meeting of the cabinet on Monday (July 29).
The facility was built in the 1960s and has stood empty since 2020.
Initially the plan was for the council to directly manage and fund the construction of a block of six flats on the site, all of which would be used as temporary accommodation for the homeless.
As of October 2022, it was expected to cost £1.45m.
Instead, that money will be used to buy property in East Grinstead on the open market and use that as temporary housing instead.
Swan Mead itself could either be sold for development or transferred to a housing association, with the potential to deliver five affordable homes on the site.
The latter would be preferred by the council.
Leader Robert Eggleston said the change was a ‘win-win’, with the social housing bringing in money which could be used to buy temporary accommodation elsewhere.
He added that selling the land to the private sector would bring no guarantee that a redevelopment would happen ‘any time soon’.
Instead, developers could sit on the site until they thought they would get the best return for their money – leaving the council ‘stepping into the unknown’.
