Mount Anvil First To Benefit As GLA Turns Development Lender

Mount Anvil has received a £50M loan from the Greater London Authority to buy sites and build new homes, the first private company to do so under a new initiative.

The loan comes from GLA Land and Property, a body set up in 2012 to replace the London Development Agency and manage the property assets of the GLA. 

The GLA said the loan was in part spurred by the need for the London development sector to get building again after the hiatus enforced by the coronavirus pandemic. Savills estimated the coronavirus has led to construction being halted on sites involving 28,600 homes in London, equivalent to 79% of total supply in 2018/19. Savills also found that most larger housebuilders have halted new acquisitions and fewer sites are being brought to market.

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Through the collaboration with the GLA, Mount Anvil is now accelerating construction of the next 2,000 homes in its pipeline and continuing its rapid expansion of land-buying activity as part of its strategy to deliver 10,000 homes in London before the end of the decade. 

The developer expects to deliver 1,400 new homes by the end of March 2025, with at least 50% of these being genuinely affordable for Londoners.

The agreement includes commitments regarding equality and diversity, as well as confirming existing commitments from Mount Anvil and the mayor, Sadiq Khan, such as never building separate entrances to segregate tenants in social properties from their private neighbours. It is hoped that this will form a model for future funding agreements with GLA Land and Property, the GLA said. 

The facility will be a commercial loan, drawn down in stages starting in June and repaid on a project-by-project basis following sales completions, with the loan facility being fully repaid by 28 February 2030, unless otherwise agreed by GLA Land and Property.

“The funding provides us with huge capacity to invest in the best available new development sites in London,” Mount Anvil Investment Director Marcus Bate said. “We’re putting all our eggs in the London basket, and will be watching that basket very closely.”