HOUSEBUILDER OF THE YEAR
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WINNER:
Another much sought-after title – Housebuilder of the Year – was next up in the award ceremonies programme.
Gyles Brandreth introduced the three contenders on the shortlist, each of them highly active housebuilders in the south.
• Inland Homes • Millgate Homes • Shanly Homes
Amersham-headquartered Inland Homes specialises in urban brownfield regeneration, and aims to put sustainability at the heart of everything the company does within its developments throughout the south. Listed on the AIM market, and with a market capitalisation of circa £100 million, Inland has a building target of 500 homes per year and current developments include Carter’s Quay, Poole; Drayton Garden Village; and The Comptons, Wooburn Green.
Millgate Homes, the award-winning builder of luxury new homes, has been a great Thames Valley success story. From its early beginnings in 1988 to its recent sale to Oaktree and merger with Countryside Properties, Millgate has grown significantly to a £50m-plus turnover. New developments include five- bed detached homes in Farnham and 41
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INLAND HOMES townhouses in Sundridge Park, Kent.
Michael Shanly founded Shanly Homes in 1969 and since then has completed over 1,200 development sites in the south of England. Judges were impressed with Shanly’s regeneration of contaminated land at Boulters Meadow, Maidenhead to create 420 homes, and also the recently launched Alexandra Park development in Maidenhead. Another part of the Group is Shanly Partnership Homes, helping to meet the demand for high quality shared-ownership homes.
Christopher Avery (pictured right), managing partner of leading Thames Valley law firm Pitmans, came to the stage to announce the winner – “a housebuilder founded in 2005 by Stephen Wicks, Nishith Malde and Paul Brett which has grown substantially and achieved a record year last year.”
To cheers and applause Avery revealed the name of Inland Homes.
Stephen Wicks (pictured centre), chief executive of Inland Homes commented later: “I am extremely proud to win this award because we have quite a small team running a large number of projects, and quite complex regeneration developments as well, so this is a fantastic team effort. I am lucky to be leading such a brilliant team.”
Wicks explained that Inland was set up to
focus on brownfield regeneration and the starter homes market – average house-price £250-£260,000. London Stock Exchange (AIM) flotation raised about £60m funding to underpin its carefully considered, often long-term, regeneration projects, such as the 77-home community development at the former RAF West Drayton.
It will be Inland Homes' 10th anniversary this year – its management team having extensive previous experience in the property sector.
Inland buys its sites with its own money, without planning permission. It now has a large land- bank, but has never yet had a planning failure, although approval can take some years.
“We take on seas of dereliction – awful buildings, polluted land – and sort it all out. It’s a massive satisfaction to see the regeneration taking place with homes, landscaping, village greens and so on.
“A lot of our schemes are coming to fruition, so we are on a lot of sites now which have taken quite a while to get into the pipeline. We are now reaping the benefits of all the hard work that we have done, getting out there building and flying the flag.
“We have a passion for our work and it’s fantastic to be recognised for that tonight.”
THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – THAMES VALLEY – JUNE 2015
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