The deadline for funding applications is 12 noon on 30^th January 2012 and the following key criteria must be met:

  – Minimum of 25 homes

  – Project (re)start no later than December 2012

  – Homes completed no later than December 2014

  – The site must be under control of the applicant by 30^th January 2012

  – Outline planning must be in place on 30^th January 2012

  – Detailed planning must be in place by 30^th July 2012

  – Government funding will be no more than 50% of development finance

The bidding process will be administered by the Homes and Communities Agency.

For small and medium sized developers who are facing funding difficulties, the Get Britain Building programme offers a useful alternative source of finance to kick-start stalled residential schemes.  First City is able to support your application for Get Britain Building finance by preparing residual valuations and supporting information to demonstrate project viability.  Through our Planning team, we can also help with securing planning permissions and negotiating Section 106 agreements in a timely manner.

For further information please contact Chris Bywater or Phil McConnachie.

The Council has commissioned Planning Consultants First City Limited to lead a public consultation event for the development proposals on land situated off Tutbury Road, Outwoods, Burton Upon Trent. 

The aim of the development is to provide facilities for people of all ages. The development will include a new high quality primary school capable of accommodating up to 420 pupils, recreation and leisure facilities including allotment plots, skateboarding area, basket ball area and children’s play area all incorporated into a new park.

The development will also include the provision of around 325 new homes offering a mix of types and sizes including much needed affordable housing with priority given to Burton Upon Trent residents.  

The development will also include significant tree belt planting along the boundaries of the site to encourage wildlife to the area. 

A public consultation event will be held on Friday 18th November 4.00pm – 8.00pm and Saturday 19th November 11.00pm – 2.00pm at Outwoods Primary School, Harehedge Lane, Burton Upon Trent to give residents the opportunity to view the plans for the development and to have their say. 

Please click here to see the full exhibition Exhibition Boards

A questionnaire has been prepared for you to provide your comments on the proposals which can be downloaded here and returned to us at the address provided on the form Questionnaire.

The closing date for comments is Friday 16th December 2011.

Just under 100 years ago, in 1914, the proportion of owner-occupiers in the UK compared to other forms of tenure was just 10%.  Today, it is 70%, the balance being made up by private rented (10%) and council / housing association (20%) property.

The mortgage market, which accounts for 39% of ALL properties, is therefore highly important to the health of the housing market.  Currently, the mortgage market is constrained by:

Lack of money available to lend

• Risk-averse attitude amongst lenders
• Disconnect between Bank of England base rates and mortgage rates.

As a result monthly mortgage approvals are running at just 50,000 per month compared to 100,000 per month in the decade up to 2007.  Activity is self-evidently down however prices are not decreasing significantly because monthly mortgage repayments are still affordable.

What is affecting activity is the size of deposit required by all lenders.  Where deposits are small (less than 30% of value), interest rates are high but where borrowers can provide a large deposit (30% of value or more), interest rates are low and still affordable.  With ongoing problems in the financial markets, we do not expect this new paradigm to change for the foreseeable future.

What does this mean for the housing market?

We expect a fundamental shift in attitude amongst potential house-buyers.  Potential buyers will have to make a choice between saving for a deposit in order to buy their first house or foregoing home-ownership altogether.  We believe that both of these trends will lead to a growing rented sector.

With the government under financial pressure of its own, we expect that the private sector will respond by increasing supply over the medium term. 

Is this outlook bad for the economy?

Not necessarily if one looks at other prosperous European countries.  In Germany, the owner-occupied sector accounts for just 45% of homes and, in France, it is 57% (UK = 70%) so this demonstrates that a larger rented sector is not necessarily a bad thing in itself.

One thing is certain; unless UK mortgage availability changes, we anticipate a change in the UK’s housing tenure mix over the coming years.

Mr Moody founder of Jack Moody PLC has commissioned Planning Consultants First City Limited to lead a public consultation event for the development proposals on land situated off Hobnock Road, Essington. 

The aim of the development is to bring the community together, to encourage the use of outdoor space and to provide facilities for people of all ages in Essington. The development will include new high quality recreation and leisure facilities incorporated into a new Essington Park. Facilities could include 2 junior football pitches, a bowling green, 24 allotment plots, a youth centre and car parking to accommodate the recreational facilities and St John’s Primary School located adjacent to the site on Hobnock Road.

The development will also include the provision of around 65 new homes offering a mix of types and sizes including much needed affordable housing with priority given to Essington residents and a managed retirement scheme. This will provide accommodation for our ever increasing ageing community in safe and secure surroundings.  

The development will also include significant tree belt planting to the east of the site to encourage wildlife to the area and to act as a sound barrier to the M6 motorway. 

Mr Moody is keen to provide local facilities and to create jobs for local people and welcomes the views and support of the community of Essington. 

A public consultation event will be held on Friday 4th November 4.00pm – 8.00pm and Saturday 5th November 11.00pm – 2.00pm at Essington Community Centre, Hobnock Road, Essington to give residents of Essington the opportunity to view the plans for the development and to have their say. 

Jack Moody PLC is based within Shareshill, South Staffordshire and this has been the home to the company since its establishment over 45 years ago. The Jack Moody PLC companies include Jack Moody Landscaping Limited, JM Nursery & Cash and Carry, JM Maintenance, JM Plant Hire, Midland Compost Recycling (MCR), Hollybush Garden Centre and A&D Garden Centre and Aquatics.  Please click here to see the full exhibition Exhibition Boards 

A questionnaire has been prepared for you to provide your comments on the proposals which can be downloaded here and returned to us at the address provided on the form Questionnaire

The site comprises approximately 9ha of land immediately adjacent to Junction 14 of the M6, close to Stafford and consent has now been granted for car showrooms, sales areas and servicing with a new prestigious business park on a gateway entrance to the town.

Work has just been completed on a new traffic light system for Junction 14 partly funded by Inglewood working with the Highways Agency. It is anticipated that work will begin in earnest on the site and linked infrastructure in spring 2012.

The development forms the only opportunity to locate headquarters offices with high quality car dealership outlets and interest is strong despite the challenging economic climate.

Gil Paris Commercial Director of Inglewood added: “Stafford desperately needs the approval of this scheme which is one of the best bits of news the town will hear this year. The scale of this project is very significant and it will take some time to complete, but I’m sure the wait will be well worth it. I’d like to thank everyone who has worked so hard over the past few years to get the planning in place to deliver this new flagship project for the businesses of Stafford. I’m delighted the final legal agreement is signed and we look forward to working with our partners to create one of the best business parks in the UK.”

This is supported by Graham Fergus who leads the company’s planning team who says- ‘evidence in the emerging updates to the Strategic Housing Land Availability studies identifies numerous settlements in the villages and small towns just outside of the West Midlands Major Urban Areas (MUA’s) – the main built up areas of Wolverhampton, Walsall and Dudley  which are considered potentially suitable for more growth than may be supported with the rigid MUA/non MUA approach in the past.

In addition the Sustainability Appraisal for the approved Black Country Core Strategy (BCJCS) whilst favouring a strategy of urban concentration does not identify significant sustainability problems with higher levels of growth outside of the MUAs.

Graham added “The Localism Bill will abolish the West Midlands Regional Strategy (RSS) when it becomes law and notwithstanding the coalition government’s consistent statements and emerging policies regarding the importance of housing delivery, they have also been consistent in indicating that the locations where individual councils can choose to provide land for housing will be largely up to them.”

First City is not calling for a wholesale abandonment of the Green Belt to the north and west of the conurbation, far from it, we are arguing that there is substantial technical evidence indicating the availability of land in sustainable locations outside of the MUA.  For example, the emerging South Staffordshire Core Strategy whilst protecting the areas of greatest threat to the Green Belt should combine this approach with more flexibility than allowed for by the RSS for individual councils to direct proportionate levels of new housing and employment growth to settlements elsewhere within their area.

 This approach will allow the flexibility to provide the best prospect of ensuring a 5 and 15 year supply of housing land as required by Planning Policy Statement 3 ‘Housing’ and will ensure councils can take decisions to direct appropriate growth to settlements that may, for example, be in need of further investment on regeneration grounds or in order to provide much needed support for local facilities.  As well as being in line with the Government’s ‘Localism’ approach to making decisions, providing a broader spread of housing locations may well also assist in speeding up the rate of housing delivery overall.

Please let us have your views on these articles by email to graham@firstcity.co.uk

At that time, there were a host of small developers who typically operated “under the radar” of the large house builders, buying small sites of under one acre and a Gross Development Value of up to about £2m.  However, with bank finance for speculative development being relatively scarce, many small developers have been driven out of the market.  Inevitably, those small developers that remain active are being very selective and are particularly keen on good locations where new homes sales are stronger.  

However there is light at the end of the tunnel.  Whereas some sites were almost un-saleable during the last two years, appetite has improved and all sites, large or small, will attract interest provided that landowners understand values are not what they were in 2007.  First City recently marketed a village development site which attracted 10 offers of up to £1.25m per acre, proving that in the best locations “small is (still) beautiful”.

One of the less publicised elements of the Government’s spending review is the decision announced by Parliamentary under-secretary of state, Bob Neill on 13^th December 2010 to scrap the business rate relief given to the owners of some empty properties.

At present empty properties with a rateable value of £18,000 or less are exempt from paying business rates.  This was introduced by the last Government as part of a package of emergency measures to address the economic downturn at the height of the crisis in for fiscal year 2009/10 in a move specifically designed to help small businesses.

Ironically it was the Labour Government who only a year earlier, 1^st April 2008, increased the empty property rate from 50% to 100% of the basic occupied business rate, after initial void periods elapsed.  For most properties, excluding industrial, the void period is three months, on industrial properties, the void period is six months.

The change was intended to encourage owners to re-let, re-develop or sell empty non-domestic buildings.  However given that most owners don’t leave properties empty by choice but rather because they can’t find occupiers it was hard to follow the logic of this argument.  Many saw the move as a thinly disguised measure to raise tax.

One demonstrable effect of the measure was that millions of square feet of unoccupied offices, shops and warehouses were demolished by owners desperate to reduce their costs.  It was also argued that it discouraged vital speculative development and regeneration schemes.

When in opposition the move was strongly citicised by Eric Pickles and Vince Cable.  However the new Government is now arguing that they are being forced to take unpopular measures to “balance the books”.  The effects of this move are yet to be assessed although the Government estimates it will raise some £400m per year.

Property focused organisations such as the R.I.C.S and BPF are lobbying the Government to re-think this move but so far the signs are not encouraging.  One thing for sure is that there will be a lot of disappointed property owners when they open their rates demand for 2011/12.

The approach is very much one of evolution rather than revolution however the firm now has a fresh new image which has been carried through all of its printed material including sales particulars.  Birmingham based media agency, Barques, have been instumental in bringing about the new look and will have an ongoing role in First City’s marketing initiatives.

First City’s Managing Director, Christopher Bywater said “Although we continue to operate in a very challenging market place we felt it was time to invest in our image; this is a measure of our confident outlook for 2011. Despite the many challenges of the last few years we look forward to 2011 with enthusiasm”

Dewick Industrial Estate formed part of the Countrywide Homes Limited in Administration portfolio.  The estate comprises 25,000 sq ft of fully let accommodation on a 5 acre (2 ha) site with longer term development potential.  Acting on behalf of the joint administrators, First City achieved a sales value in excess of the £1.4m guide price.

First City are also instructed by the same administrators to sell Bluebird Industrial Estate in Wolverhampton, an 8.2 acre (3.3 ha) estate with 120,000 sq ft of buildings.  Again, this property is income-producing and has significant redevelopment potential.  The property is currently under offer and the sale is expected to complete in the coming weeks.

Phil McConnachie, development land agent at First City, comments “What is remarkable is the level of interest shown in both properties.  Bluebird, in particular, attracted unprecedented levels of enquiries.  This shows that for properties with an income and an angle, there is cash out there”.

For further information, please contact Phil McConnachie at First City.