First-time buyers aged between 23 and 40 may soon be able to buy a new home at a discount of a least 20% below market value, under the government’s ‘Starter Home’ initiative.

The properties will start being built this year, the housing minister Gavin Barwell confirmed at the beginning of the New Year, with an initial group of 30 local authority partnerships leading the schemes.

Funding will be supported by the government’s £1.2 billion Starter Homes Land fund, which was established last April.

The fund was set up to assist the aim of building 200,000 Starter Homes by 2020 on brownfield sites in England, such as those currently or previously used for commercial or industrial purposes.

However, critics of the scheme claim that as the maximum price after the discount has been applied will be £250,000 outside London and £450,000 in the capital, the new properties won’t be affordable for many first-time buyers.

It’s expected that they won’t be able to sell on or let their Starter Homes at their open market value for a period of at least five years after the initial sale.