Financially-troubled housing corporation Vestia is to sell 15,000 homes in an effort to cancel out its debts, the organisation said in a letter to home affairs minister Liesbeth Spies.

Vestia is also to reduce its plans to build new housing stock and increase rents for new tenants to almost the legal maximum.
Rotterdam-based Vestia, the biggest housing corporation in the country with 79,000 homes under management, is embroiled in a fraud investigation. Its finance chief has been arrested in connection with bribery and tax avoidance.
The organisation ran into difficulty after speculating on the financial markets on interest rates. It has since had to give banks €1.5bn in security for loans and will have to find more cash if interest rates fall further.
Minister Spies and the housing corporation’s financial watchdog CFV have both rejected the plan for not going far enough. In particular, the CFV says Vestia should halt its entire building programme where legally possible, the NRC reported.