Monmouthshire launched a county-wide Choice Based Lettings scheme in January 2011 using LHS products and services. 

The scheme, called Monmouthshire Homesearch, is a partnership of Monmouthshire County Council, Monmouthshire Housing Association, Melin Homes and Charter Housing.

Monmouthshire Housing Association (MHA) Ltd was established in January 2008, to receive the housing stock of Monmouthshire County Council through a large-scale voluntary transfer. 

Monmouthshire has a population of around 77,000 and is a large county with several towns, including Abergavenny, Chepstow, Monmouth and Usk and many small villages.

The scheme has a common Housing Register with the ability to accept on-line applications that acts as a single point of application for social housing applicants. Monmouthshire Housing Association manages the Register.

Monmouthshire is the first county to take LHS products and services in Wales. It is also the first in the UK to use the new Housing Register Review Module that was developed by LHS for West Berkshire.  The Review Module performs Annual Reviews (and other reviews) in a managed process that complements the Housing Register and creates significant savings for the scheme.

The Monmouthshire Homesearch website launched in November 2010, to allow all applicants to re-register, while the choice based lettings element started in January 2011. The scheme runs a two-weekly bidding cycle with all available properties advertised on the Homesearch website.

The scheme has a common assessment policy as well as a common allocations policy.  It has moved from an existing points system to a banding allocations system - operating Bands 1-5.

Monmouthshire Homesearch will also be the first to use a new “rural connection” icon to help advertise properties where a specific local connection is required.  The icon will save Housing Officers considerable time as applicants can be filtered on the shortlist based on their connections to specific rural areas.