The 1980's
The origins of Nettleton Road Housing Co-Operative lie in the summer of 1981, when the council decided to re-house all the residents of the street due to the properties not being fit for human habitation. None of the houses had a bathroom or an inside toilet, the only form of heating was open fires, the electrical wiring was old and decrepit and the roofs were all in a bad state of repair.
A group of four friends looking for somewhere to live approached the elderly resident of #18 who they knew was moving out that week, and asked her to leave them a set of keys. She was happy to do so, and they moved in and employed a local locksmith to fit a new set of locks.
The first house in the road was now squatted.
A few days later the council sent the same locksmith to change the locks on what as far as they were concerned was an empty property. Luckily, when he was met with the same people that less than a week earlier had already paid him to change the locks, the resulting confusion (“No mate, we live here. Must be some kind of mistake”) meant that he went away and the locks remained unchanged.
The friends decided to try to set themselves up as a Housing Co-op and approached South London Family Housing Association to arrange a management agreement.
After some persuasion the Housing Association agreed, provided that Lewisham Council would grant the co-op a licence. Having no idea how to go about this, they took the bold step of writing to the Head of Housing and inviting him to tea, and to his credit, he agreed. So over endless cups of tea, sitting on the moth eaten sofa bought from the second hand shop on the corner, a deal was agreed that allowed the creation of Nettleton Road Housing Co-Operative, on a short-life basis for a maximum of five years. Once there was a legal basis for the occupation of the empty houses, more people joined the co-op until it included most of the houses in the road, and even some on New Cross Road.
Residents spent a lot of time and money improving the houses (repairing roofs, rebuilding collapsed brickwork and replacing electrical wiring). There was a communal shop, where the co-op bought non-perishable goods in bulk and sold them at cost to members, and even a communal laundry.
The co-op was so successful that it made a healthy profit, until it was pointed out by the accountant that as a Friendly Society, this was not allowed. This caused some consternation until it was decided that washing machines counted as ‘up-keep and improvement of the properties’, and the co-op bought one for each house, just in time for Christmas.
“It was a proper community. We sat out on the steps; we looked after each other’s kids; we cut each other’s hair; we went to gigs together.”
The 1990's
During the 1990s the Thatcher Government decided that councils could ‘recycle receipts’ from stock they were not going to develop, where previously the money would have gone to central government.
Between 1993-5 the council decided to sell their properties in Nettleton Road (and elsewhere). A group of residents came together to formally set up the co-op as a separate legal entity (adding the ‘Ltd’ to the name), and with the help of a consultant (Bob Williams - we couldn’t have done it without him!), a new tenancy agreement, policies, and other documents were produced and a bid was submitted to the council to purchase eight properties.
The houses were bought from the council at a 40% discount on the current market value.
A loan of £352,000.00 was arranged via The Co-operative Bank and on the advice of Eddie Capone (the then owner of Black Rock Studio on Clifton Rise, and local Labour neighbourhood councillor) a successful application for £150, 000 to carry out major works required as a condition of the loan was made to Deptford City Challenge, the local regeneration fund at that time.