The next focusIR Investor Webinar takes places on 14th May with guest speakers from Blue Whale Growth Fund, Taseko Mines, Kavango Resources and CQS Natural Resources fund. Please register here.
London South East prides itself on its community spirit, and in order to keep the chat section problem free, we ask all members to follow these simple rules. In these rules, we refer to ourselves as "we", "us", "our". The user of the website is referred to as "you" and "your".
By posting on our share chat boards you are agreeing to the following:
The IP address of all posts is recorded to aid in enforcing these conditions. As a user you agree to any information you have entered being stored in a database. You agree that we have the right to remove, edit, move or close any topic or board at any time should we see fit. You agree that we have the right to remove any post without notice. You agree that we have the right to suspend your account without notice.
Please note some users may not behave properly and may post content that is misleading, untrue or offensive.
It is not possible for us to fully monitor all content all of the time but where we have actually received notice of any content that is potentially misleading, untrue, offensive, unlawful, infringes third party rights or is potentially in breach of these terms and conditions, then we will review such content, decide whether to remove it from this website and act accordingly.
Premium Members are members that have a premium subscription with London South East. You can subscribe here.
London South East does not endorse such members, and posts should not be construed as advice and represent the opinions of the authors, not those of London South East Ltd, or its affiliates.
Fair play to Wicks having been around the block has been doing all the right things . As Oi Oi said keeping the teams together & the cashflow oiled by jumping into bed at the earliest opportunity with HAs and feeding the BTR market is the way to go
Selective land sales where possible on the premise you can't go broke making a profit
Development land values have a nasty habit of depth charging if demand ratchetes down a few notches .Problems tend to occur for developers like Inland when land payments on sites where payments are triggered by planning or infrastructure events rather than demand led . Then leaving the developer with the thorny problem of finding the construction monies in a difficult lending to build out and try and salvage some money
Shareholders can think themselves lucky they have a steady hand on the rudder
A well known successful developer many moons back had optioned up a large residential site not that far from 1 of Inland d's developments .
Planning progressing satisfactorily when the landowner made contact suggested that in consideration for the developer exercising the option sooner he would accept a discount on the price agreed.
Smelling blood he checked him out and found out he was under pressure but not critical and banked with the same bank but different region .
Sent a message back through his regional director at the bank to the site owner's banker to say that he had no intention of exercising the option but was going to sit it out which still had sometime to run making the freehold interest very unsaleable to a third party and the likelihood of the site owner having money anytime soon non -existent
The bank pulled the rug on the landowner receiving this news and then the developer stepped in and picked the freehold interest of the site up for a song .
We digress.!
I really feel that we're due for another announcement from INL. And it might be a purchase rather than a sale. I'm not on the inside or anything, have no knowledge but it's a month or so since the last rns and i just feel INL have momentum.
Thanks Oi Oi that's a really helpful insight into this market. I was looking at the current share price and value, adding the level of debt and concluding that it seemed significantly undervalued, but as you point out there are lots of variables in reality.
It's difficult to say what values Cheshunt and Wilton Park represent in all honesty (not without alot of due diligence and investigative work into the consents, the values, CIL calculations, S106 liabilities, S278 costs, affordable percentages, build cost methodologies etc etc etc). It would be wrong of me to say 'I'll do that' when I'm flat out this week and into early next too. But I will do some work on current values. But looking into the future and where values are there? I've no idea how bad it could get tbh. It's why I like the deals they've been doing with HA's - it's effectively government money and the Affordable housing will be built, come what may. Ithink, in these circumstances, to survive and live to fight another day is more important than being a short-term hero (profit) and then promptly dying in the next skirmish. Opportunities will come to those whom survive. I'm seeing it myself - so many people and companies are responding to my letters (I write to sites each week - trying to avoid agents in the hope of negotiating direct with the owners).
Alan80 - apologies - I've been so busy with work (buying development sites!) that I've not had a chance to check in to lse recently.
Oi Oi what sort of value would you put on Cheshunt and Wilton park if in the unlikely event there had to be a fire sale?
It all sounds positive to me - deals happening and gearing reduced whilst borrowing more to increase housebuilding schemes by 50% - 4 to 6. Of course would be better to be able to increase activity without having to borrow, but that's some way off. Happy with the positive vibe about future prospects.
And lo....Mr Wicks has spoken! 2 interesting RNS's this morning (and one technical one about shares making the 3 RNS's released)- particularly the deals struck with the BTR fund for parts of two sites that INL are developing out. The HSBC facility is a good indicator too (you wouldn't draw on it if you weren't going to use it over the next couple of years. I still think there are other announcements in the pipeline but I'm guessing they'll take a breather for the moment to let the mkt digest this recent raft of news.
Stephen Wicks on Linkedin posting: "Another day, another deal to sign, a very nice forward sale of 123 units in High Wycombe to a major BTR fund. The rain forests suffered with all the documents on this one!"
Ok - so I was slightly out on the timings (saying perhaps the 4th or 5th September would be 'news day on deals' but nevertheless; today's news that two have completed (and the proceeds, £25mill, used to pay down debt) is good. I'm waiting for news on the other 3 deals however (as the ones above were already in the pipeline/anticipated).
Inland Homes received the approval from the Mayor of London for our planning application at the former Master Brewer site in Hillingdon yesterday afternoon.
The planning application reflects a landscape-led, high-quality residential scheme of 514 homes of which 182 homes will be affordable. These new homes will create a new residential neighbourhood that transforms a brownfield site into an extension of a wider bio-diverse green network that will help promote a healthy lifestyle for residents and visitors from the wider community.
In line with emerging and national objectives and working closely with the London Wildlife Trust, we have aimed to integrate biodiversity into the design of these proposals and enhance the existing wider natural assets in the area, thus forming a Nature Recovery Network. We called this the ‘green infrastructure’ of our proposals which, has enabled us to achieve a 26% biodiversity net gain and achieve a high urban greening factor of 0.4.
We are pleased to be contributing to the Mayor’s affordable housing and overall housing targets in London.
A great team effort and our thanks to all involved!
It's been a couple of weeks since my last post and it just feels like there's going to be some news - perhaps tomorrow, more likely Monday (deals usually exchange on a Friday as it's a natural deadline). Wicks will be motoring to capture the froth that's in the market at the moment (it is v v busy in the land market at the moment - I'm in it, working for a developer acquiring sites). Mad, mad market out there - so much going on with the effects (long term?) of corona to the office market, industrial, distribution, the new PD rights (permitted development), the new all-encompassing business class (which changes things in terms the high street), the presumption in favour of development that exists today, the pressure on planning departments to listen to the govt's message 'get britain building' (they wont listen.....); so much going on and I've not even touched on the effects of corona on vendor's having the time to make decisions and more important - when they've made a decision (to sell) they are acting. That, in itself, is massive. Anyway, I digress. Got a feeling there's going to be some news soon.