Housebuilder sets 1,500 new homes target for 2025

Wavensmere Homes has said it will be targeting brownfield land acquisitions this year, with the aim of delivering 1,500 new homes.

The firm, which is behind the Nightingale Quarter, Friar Gate Goods Yard and Cathedral One schemes in Derby, completed 476 houses and apartments during 2024, achieving a record turnover of £105 million.

The housebuilder handed over the keys to 96 houses and 380 apartments last year across its developments, including its £175 million Nightingale Quarter scheme in Derby city centre.

Established in 2015, Wavensmere specialises in urban regeneration, specifically targeting large, complex sites with unique history and character.

Managing director James Dickens said: “We have exceeded 2023’s £100 million turnover and could not be more excited about 2025.

“We will also be marking our 10th year by breaking ground on four important brownfield sites during the first half of 2025.

“We obtained detailed planning for this quartet of regeneration projects throughout the course of 2024, totalling over 950 houses, apartments and co-living properties.

“Having delivered 1,000 homes on brownfield land during the past 24 months, we are well positioned to progress with our current growth trajectory and the implementation of our five-year business plan.

“We support the sentiment of the Government’s NPPF announcement, but unforeseen pre-construction delays are still causing setbacks and will frustratingly impact the number of home completions Wavensmere had targeted to deliver during 2025.”

Wavensmere is set to complete five-year build programme at Nightingale Quarter in November, delivering a total of 925 homes on the former Derbyshire Royal Infirmary site.

Last year, the firm began work to redevelop Friar Gate Goods Yard.

The nationally significant £75 million mixed-use project will reanimate two landmark Grade II listed buildings into over 110,000 sq ft of commercial space, alongside 276 new build homes.

The first 63 terraced houses will be available for occupation before the end of 2026.

The full redevelopment, restoration and construction programme is anticipated to complete by the end of 2028.

Wavensmere Homes and Wilson Bowden Developments’ £30 million redevelopment of one of the final plots of vacant land within Derby’s newly revitalised Cathedral Quarter will get underway this year.

195 studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments will be delivered at the Full Street site, within a finely detailed u-shaped nine-storey red brick building.

And in the next few months, Wavensmere will commence construction at Milford Mills, which overlooks the River Derwent, located between Belper and Duffield.

The development will comprise 69 new homes occupying the historic brownfield site, which is within the Derwent Valley Mills UNESCO World Heritage Site.