Thursday 18 June 2015

Land banking? Us?

From an infographic in the paper version of this article:

Berkeley land bank plots: 37,473
Homes sold last year: 3,355


6 comments:

L fairfax said...

Allegedly - I am not saying this -
because it takes a long time to plan, get planning permission etc they need to do this.
It could be true, although it if were true paying council tax from day 1 that planning permission is granted they would probably become more efficient.
PS feel free to point out any holes in my argument.

Mark Wadsworth said...

LF, that is the foul excuse they use. Fact is, their profit maximising output level is what it is and that is how many homes they build. Why would they build more? If they had land for a million homes, why would they build more than their profit maximising level?

Lola said...

I'm with MW. My dad was a small developer. His 'land bank' was about 2 years worth +/- a year at any one time. And he made a good living from that. You do not need to hold 10 years plots, unless you are also land dealing on the back of winning some little licences to build houses.

Mark Wadsworth said...

L, thanks for back up, I suspected as much.

L fairfax said...

I did say that I was not saying that - I thought that it was a bit of a weak argument.

Mark Wadsworth said...

LF, I was agreeing with you 😊