A "SWAP shop" for council homes is to be set up by city leaders in a bid to ease Edinburgh's affordable housing crisis.
Council tenants are to be given access to a new website where they can put their own home up for grabs in exchange for another tenant's property.
The initiative is designed to get the coveted, larger family council homes circulated more often and
ease pressure on the EdIndex bidding system used to secure council and social housing tenancies.
Demand for affordable housing in Edinburgh is so acute that 150 people on average are chasing every council home that becomes available.
City leaders hope the Edinburgh House Exchange scheme will be able to match up people looking to downsize with those looking for larger properties or move to a new area of the city.
The council or housing association will have the final say on the match. The move comes as city leaders today unveiled a £40 million spending package for its housing stock, which will include more than 1,700 new bathrooms and kitchens.
City leaders today said the new service will prove very useful for those looking for a new home.
Opposition politicians welcomed the move, but called on the new 'swap shop' to be opened up to those who don't have internet access.
Gordon Munro, the city's Labour party housing spokesman, said: "This is a good idea but what about the people who do not have access to the internet, or find the web intimidating?
"There will be a range of age groups who will be looking to swap homes, and particularly older people might want to move from larger to smaller properties but they need to be given the means to do this.
"We do have the libraries which have internet access, but more needs to be done to ensure that nobody misses out."
Although Edinburgh has one of the quickest turnarounds for empty council houses, there are simply not enough. There were more than 400,000 bids for just 2,700 council homes on the EdIndex system over the last year.
It is estimated 12,000 new affordable homes will be needed in the Capital in the next ten years.
Construction work on the first new council houses in Edinburgh for more than 20 years at Gracemount is set to get under way next year, though only 139 of the 1,100 currently planned across the city will actually be available for rent because of funding shortages.
Councillor Paul Edie, the city's housing leader, said: "People swap houses for all sorts of reasons, from needing more space to wanting to be closer to work or family. This is such a useful tool as it allows people to make a mutually beneficial swap."
