A community benefit company called Peacock and Verity Community Spaces has already secured full planning permission to refurbish 15 Silver Street and create four affordable apartments on the upper floor as well as a new heritage centre, café, shop and post office below.

At a meeting last week, the council's cabinet member for housing and safer communities, Cllr Mike Chambers, rubber-stamped awarding a grant that will go towards the housing element of the project.

Volunteers at P&VCS have been working for over five years to transform the heritage building, which has been a shop for over 200 years, into a long-term community asset.

Last year, P&VCS won £72,000 from the council to help buy the building alongside housing association Karbon, which will manage the homes.

What is community-led housing?

Community-led housing developments are designed by local people and built to meet the needs of the community, such as for more affordable or greener housing.

The most famous UK example is the Granby 4 Streets project in Liverpool. A community housing trust purchased a row of derelict homes for £1 each before bringing them back into use and renting them to local people. The refurbishment won the Turner Prize for art in 2015.

But community-led housing is also a way of locking in low rents in affluent areas so that young people or families are not forced to move away from the places where they grew up.

P&VCS' mission statement states the homes in Masham will only be available to people with family, work or historic links to the area.

Read More:

• New Masham restaurant wins Michelin Guide accolade


• Hot Seat: the youthful councillor leading transport in North Yorkshire

Benefits to Masham

Masham has lost two banks, a post office and newsagent in recent years and P&VCS hopes the ambitious development will become a hub for the community.

It says it wants the homes to have character and not be “identikit boxes”, which it believes will improve the residents’ self-worth and well-being.

Its website states: