Do builders really have too many land banks?

If you’ve ever wondered why it takes so long for new homes developments in your area to go from planning permission to completion, then a report by the Campaign for Rural England (CPRE) attempts to explain the strange world of land banks. The CPRE’s dossier on  new homes building  in the UK is a damming summary of the factors that prevent more new homes being built in the UK, something that  frustrates many of the agents waiting to sell them. The Getting Houses Built report, published this month, lays the blame at the feet of the developers, which it collars for focussing too much on profit while “dictating supply but not meeting need”. One of the more surprising facts to emerge from the report is that the nine largest volume builders have a land bank of some 340,000 housing plots. While the CPRE admits that shareholder value will never override national house-building targets, it says the high levels of land ‘banked’ reveal the need for urgent reform. To fix this problem, the CPRE suggests that developers are granted planning permission on a ‘use it or lose it’ basis with a five-year limit, after which land would be compulsorily purchased off…