Strategic Land: Land with Potential
Appraising land with the potential to be developed, creating the best approach, and implementing the most useful strategy, is of the utmost importance for achieving the optimal result, however measured.
Suitable land is in high demand, particularly for residential development. This is as true for larger sites, possibly assembled from a number of parcels, as it is for more modest sites. For owners looking to realise and enhance the most advantageous value of their land, understanding and adopting the most well-considered foundational strategy – before embarking on a sale or disposal process – is of vital importance.
What is Strategic Land?
Hambleden has a particular expertise for land that has a potential for development but currently has little or no designated planning status. Known as ‘Strategic Land’, these opportunities require a comprehensive and considered preliminary process to secure planning status, prior to the submission of the planning application itself.
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Land that has potential for development needs to be scrutinised in detail to ensure that the right land is developed and that the right form of development takes place in line with the local and national planning policy.
Promotion
This process, known as ‘Promotion’, requires extensive, detailed assessment of the land, expert knowledge of the local and national planning policy, public relations and community engagement, and combining these to create an attractive and deliverable development opportunity for inclusion into the local planning authority’s Local Development Plan, followed by a planning application to secure development.
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The Promotion of Strategic Land can be both expensive and lengthy, and most often landowners need someone to provide the expertise, but also to shoulder the significant financial risk required for successful promotion.
There are two principal ways in which landowners can achieve this:
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By appointing a Housebuilder to promote the land before acquiring the land to build houses,
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By appointing a Promoter to promote that land before then jointly selling the land to a Housebuilder.
How to progress a Strategic Land Project
At Hambleden we specialise in helping Landowners bring strategic land forward for development. In the majority of cases this involves appointing a promoter or housebuilder to take the land through the planning system – firstly by promoting the site to the Local Plan as a site suitable for development, and then by submitting a planning application to secure permission for the development to proceed. We advise Landowners on how to structure this appointment, and who to appoint, to ensure the best possible chance of success. We then work for the Landowners to monitor the project all the way until the land is sold with the benefit of planning.
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There are four broad stages to this process, each of which require professional expertise to ensure that the Landowners interests are protected and optimised.
1. Preparation
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Understand the land, the planning opportunities, potential valuation, and the Landowners’ priorities and objectives
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Investigate technical constraints and undertake any initial work to enhance the opportunity
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Advise and agree on the project strategy
2. Marketing Strategy
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Assemble marketing materials and information dossier for the opportunity
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Engage and negotiate with potential scheme partners – Promoters or Housebuilders
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Interview the strongest potential partners,
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Select promotion partner and oversee legal contracts
3. Planning and Promotion
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Oversee Promotion activities, liaise with the project team
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Third-party negotiations, stakeholder management and project meetings
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Ensure Local Plan allocation meets landowner requirements
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Oversee the planning application process, negotiate planning agreements, and ensure satisfactory planning permission is optimal
4. Sale or Disposal
Promoter route
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Work with the Promoter to market the site with its planning permission
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Oversee sale process to ensure best outcome for the landowners
Housebuilder route
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Oversee the sale process to the housebuilder
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Appraise, evaluate and negotiate with the housebuilder to ensure best possible price
Progressing Strategic Land through to a successful, developed, conclusion demands skill, experience and understanding of the processes involved, particularly those concerning the planning context and practicalities, contract structures, and sale negotiations.
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This is what Hambleden specialises in – formulating and managing the correct strategy that tenaciously champions landowner interests, promotes site attributes, and manages the whole process through to a successful sale.
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If you have land that you think might be suitable for development, or that has already been identified as potential development land and would like to know what to do next, Hambleden would be delighted to talk through the next steps. Please contact us for a no-obligation discussion. ​
Immediate Land
A significant step in the Strategic Land development process outlined above is when the previously unallocated land has gained planning permission. The process leading up to that point may have taken some time to get to, but the land is now ready for development (in the context of disposing of the land). Land that has planning permission, or has a planning policy status enabling development, is therefore often known as Immediate Land.
