Former Waverley Housing Chair Rita Stenhouse
on retiring from the Housing Sector
Former Chair of Waverley Housing, Rita Stenhouse, has reflected on her career as a housing professional and Board member after retiring from the Board in September last year.
During an extensive housing career, Rita began working for Scottish Special Housing Association in 1973 as a Housing Officer, before going onto work in a series of senior management positions across the social housing sector.
This included finishing her working career as Director of Community Ownership with Communities Scotland in which she played an influential role within the Scottish Executive Housing and Strategy Division to develop the Scottish Housing Quality Standard.
In this role, she also overseen 144 individual transfers of Scottish Homes stock to new or existing housing associations.
In an interview with SFHA News, Rita said that housing was a rewarding career choice and underlined the importance of gaining her professional CIH qualifications in allowing her to work across various roles.
She said: “Attaining professional qualifications is hugely important for a career in housing, and in my experience, it allowed me to gain the skills and experience to work across many different jobs in the sector.”
As well as various professional roles, during her career Rita also served on the Board of CIH Scotland in several roles including membership officer, treasurer, and Chair.
She joined the Board of Waverley Housing, based in the central Scottish Borders, in 2008 – this included serving as Chair between 2012 and 2017.
When asked why people should join the Board of a housing association, Rita said: “Getting involved with your local housing association is a great way to provide a general benefit to the wider community and the social housing sector as a whole.”
Following her retirement from Waverley’s Board in September, Rita said she has enjoyed going to the gym and looks forward to meeting up with friends and family and going on more holidays.
If you’re interested in joining the Board of a housing association, please feel free to sign up for the SFHA’s OnBoard service where we match people interested in serving on the Board of a housing association with live vacancies.
