Barratt Share Price: Homebuilder Accelerates London Property Investment

iNVEZZ.com Wednesday, July 24th: Barratt Developments (LON:BDEV), Britain’s largest homebuilder by volume, has announced plans to accelerate property investment in London, as it looks to increase its footprint in the British capital where price increases have outshone the wider market.

**New JVs to Fuel Barratt’s Development Pipeline**
In a statement published today Barratt Developments said that it had inked two new joint venture (JV) deals, which would bring a total of 1,100 new London homes to market . In their first major partnership, Barratt and peer British Land (LON:BLND) have secured planning permission for 463 homes, a 160-room hotel, retail and office space at Aldgate Place on the edge of the City of London. Work on the £250-million development is scheduled to start in early 2014.

Barratt also confirmed today a further joint venture with housing association London & Quadrant (L&Q) to develop a site in the Nine Elms district. The project has a gross development value (GDV) of £425 million with planning permission for 645 homes, a new Sainsbury store and 27,000 square feet of retail and office space.
**Annual Target of 2,000 London Property Completions**

Barratt’s Chief Executive Officer Mark Clare said in the group’s statement today: “Our Barratt London business is expanding fast and we are now working on £2 billion of new developments with four JV partners – British Land, L&Q, Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing and Metropolitan Housing.” He added that the company was now targeting 2,000 completions annually from its London business in the medium term, without specifying the exact number of years they would be built over.

Barratt has recently focused on building in London where strong demand from foreign investors and a resilient local economy have kept property investment demand and prices high despite a slump in the wider UK housing market. As a result, the company’s London property completions this year have totalled 1,586 as of the end of 30 June, up from 1,292 last year. The new homes had a selling price of between £160,000 and £6 million, Barratt noted in its statement today.

!m[British Developer Plans to Deliver 2,000 New London Homes a Year](/uploads/story/4299/thumbs/pic1_inline.png)
According to mortgage lender Nationwide, London house prices rose 5.2 percent in June, compared to a 0.3 percent increase across the broader UK housing market, stretching the gap between the capital and the rest of the country to its widest level ever.
Barratt and other British homebuilders have also received a boost from the government’s flagship Help to Buy scheme which offers equity loans to allow buyers to get onto the property ladder with a deposit of as little as five percent.
**The Barratt share price in London was 0.63 percent higher at £344.06p as of 11:35 BST today. The company’s stock has gained almost 66 percent in the yesterday.**