An investigation of the role and significance of specialist land promoters in the housing land development market in the UK

Focussing on the firm level, this paper investigates the importance of specialist land promoters in the strategic housing land market in the UK. Planning data for the period 2018-19 were collected and analysed to estimate the proportion of large housing sites where outline consent was granted to specialist land promoters. The paper makes three contributions. Firstly, it maps the diversity of organisations that promote land through the UK planning system and demonstrates the diversity and definitional fuzziness of the organisations operating in the contemporary UK land market. Secondly, in contrast to prior studies which have grouped specialist land promoters with other types of market actor, it was found that specialist land promoters made a relatively small contribution to the supply of housing land in the study period. Finally, the paper shows that housebuilders accounted for a minority of planning consents for residential development, thereby suggesting that the degree of vertical integration in the land and housing development sector in the UK may be lower than presumed.