Letter: Land Values and the Local Plan

Published on: 26 May, 2017
Updated on: 26 May, 2017

From James Wild

In response to: Letter: We Need to Strike A Balance Between Preservation and Meeting Social Need

With regards to Gordon Bridger’s comments on land values I just thought I would throw in my pennyworth.

My experience, being in the business, is that you would pay around 30-40% for the land. The build costs would represent approx 35% and the developer would look to take the rest as his profit.

The proposed Community Infrastructure Levy or CIL (to pay for local infrastructure) is going to reduce land values further as for a typical 3-bed 1500 sq ft dwelling Guildford are looking to charge approx £45,000 minimum at £300 per sq metre.

So for a new 3-bed home of 1500 sq ft sold for £450K the land owner might expect to get £100k when the new plan and charging structures are adopted.

It is important to remember that landowners are also going to be expected to give up 40% of their land (if over 0.17ha in size ) for these, so-called, affordable homes.

Of course farmers with large tranches of land at very low values will still jump at the opportunity to sell but certainly smaller sites quite often with high residual values are going to look far less viable when this plan is adopted.

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