It appears almost certain that there will be another new housing minister named when a new Conservative leader - and thus Prime Minister - is elected by members over the coming months.
With the weekend political TV shows dominated by speculation over which of the many potential candidates might succeed, a consequence of any change will be a reshuffle of the Cabinet and junior ministerial posts.
Kit Malthouse has been in the post as housing minister now for just under eleven months - a short time but significantly longer than some of his predecessors. James Brokenshire, secretary of state at the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, has been in the post for just under fourteen months.
Malthouse has been the seventeenth housing minister in only twenty-two years and the merry-go-round of people in that post - just as rapidly turning under recent Labour governments as under the past nine years of Conservative-led government - has caused long-standing frustration in the agency and construction industries.
The post has recently been seen as a stepping stone to other things.
Malthouse's predecessor as housing minister, Dominic Raab, is now front runner in the race to succeed Theresa May as Tory leader; the minister before that, Alok Sharma, was moved to what is seen as a more senior role at the Department of Work and Pensions; and the one before that, Gavin Barwell, became advisor to May herself after he lost his parliamentary seat in the snap General Election in 2017.
HERE'S THE LIST OF HOUSING MINISTERS SINCE 1997:
- Hilary Armstrong (1997 - 1999)
- Nick Raynsford (199 - 2001)
- Charlie Falconer (2001 - 2001)
- Jeff Rooker (2001 - 2003)
- Keith Hill (2003 - 2005)
- Yvette Cooper (2005 - 2007)
- Caroline Flint (2007 - 2008)
- Margaret Beckett (2008 - 2009)
- John Healey (2009 - 2010)
- Grant Shapps (2010 - 2012)
- Mark Prisk (2012 - 2013)
- Kris Hopkins (2013 - 2014)
-Brandon Lewis (2014 - 2016)
- Gavin Barwell (2016 - 2017)
- Alok Sharma (2017 - 2018)
- Dominic Raab (2018)
- Kit Malthouse (2018 - 2019)
As seen in EstateAgent TODAY