Director of Income and Leasehold

Reporting to the Executive Director of Tenancy Services, the Director of Income and Leasehold will have overall responsibility for developing Midland Heart’s approach to collecting rent and service charge income, improving collection rates, and ensuring the organisation remains focused on sustaining tenancies.Midland Heart is a housing association that delivers homes and services across the Midlands. They own and manage over 35,000 homes and are dedicated to providing high-quality, safe, and affordable homes, combined with excellent services to over 70,000 customers.Midland Heart’s upcoming corporate plan, launching in April 2025, is their most ambitious yet. It focuses on creating an Individual Tenant Experience that anticipates tenant needs, reducing their need to contact and ensuring smoother home management. This newly created role will play a pivotal role in delivering this ambitious new plan and creating a sector-leading service to their tenants.Ensuring that the organisation remains financially resilient and continues to support tenants to sustain their tenancies will be the main priority of this role. The successful candidate will be accountable for maintaining Midland Heart’s sector-leading performance, most notably their record low levels of rent arrears, while creating new strategies to ensure the organisation is continuing to identify trends that lead to rent arrears and ultimately tenancy failure.This role is predominantly office-based with an expectation to be located within a commutable distance from one of their office locations based in the Midlands.Key responsibilities include:Ensure there’s an effective income collection policy that maximises rent, service charge collection as well as other costs, whilst also providing a positive experience for anyone paying their rent, making enquiries, or managing their account.Understanding trends in arrears and working across the business to put in place preventative strategies that stop tenants getting into arrears and support people to sustain their tenancies.Ensure there are robust sinking funds in place to fund property investment plans.Lead the strategy to simplify the relationship with Mutual Housing Associations.Develop robust processes to manage leased buildings and commercial premises.As a member of the Directors Group ensure strong operational performance across all areas of the business identifying and addressing areas where performance falls below agreed levels of performance.Midland Heart is looking to appoint a senior leader who has the following attributes:Substantial experience in managing income collection as well as rent and service charge setting.Thorough understanding of legal and regulatory requirements in relation to rent setting and leasehold management.Significant experience leading diverse functions, defining the vision, setting the strategy, and delivering positive outcomes.For an informal discussion, please contact Tom Neely (#####), or Eliot Jeffries (#####)