The apartments, based on the site of St Luke's Church, Frank Street, will be let to people nominated by the council who are on the housing waiting list. This will help to meet local housing needs in a town centre, accessible location.

Riverside North East is ploughing around £1.1m into the development with £649,000 provided by the Housing Corporation's National Affordable Housing Programme.

Church amenity buildings currently used by community groups will be rebuilt within the existing structure of the church building.

Steve Ward is Director of Riverside North East said: "This development
is one of our three planned new-build programmes to provide much needed affordable housing for rent or shared ownership in the north east.

The apartments will be completed by this time next year and I am sure they will be a popular choice for local people."

Riverside North East is investing around £30million over the next four years to provide 500 more affordable homes for the region.

The social landlord is working with Blyth Valley Borough Council to build new homes to rent in Blyth. And is also funding the redevelopment of a young person's housing service in Wellington Street, Middlesbrough.

North Tyneside's elected mayor, John Harrison, added: "Increasing the supply of affordable homes is one of our key commitments. We want to make sure that, as a borough, we can offer an excellent range of housing options that meet increasingly diverse needs.

"This will help meet our vision of quality homes, excellent services and strong communities."

The Wellington Street scheme in Middlesbrough is a single person's homelessness service aimed at those who are vulnerably housed or homeless.

The direct access properties will be a springboard to training, jobs and opportunities for young vulnerable people.

The facility will house training rooms, gym, community café, office accommodation and a health facility for drug and alcohol teams.