Festive cheer for selfbuilders
The government has announced plans to create more new homes for England’s cities with the January launch of a £100m Brownfield Land Release fund.
This will support brownfield development, estates regeneration and development on public sector land including serviced plots for self and custom build. The fund is available to all councils across England, with the exception of Mayoral Combined Authorities.
The government guidance states that “a significant portion of this new £100m will go to supporting self- and custom-builders – a growing sector which the government is committed to.” Councils have been invited use the time between now and the prospectus launch to consider and prepare their bids.
The announcement has been welcomed by the National Custom and Self Build Association. Its CEO, Andrew Baddeley-Chappell, said: “This is more festive cheer for the custom and self-build sector. The investment in bringing forward carefully selected sites for serviced plots of land offers the opportunity to deliver a number of exemplar sites across England.”
Recent wider support for custom and self-build includes:
* A government review of the Right to Build legislation
* Annual publication of data that councils collect on self and custom build in their area.
* Forthcoming launch of Help to Build equity loan scheme for custom and selfbuilders
The Right to Build Task Force has also launched Custom and Self-Build Planning Guidance to support the sector in addition to a new website www.righttobuild.org.uk.
