Wigan Council have created an information hub to support SME housing developers who want to build new homes in Wigan Borough.
There is untapped potential in small and large sites around the borough and there are opportunities to create thriving places for people to live, providing greater opportunity and choice to access homes and bring stalled and unused land back into use.
The council recognised that removing or helping to mitigate the barriers that SME developers can face would assist in increasing the number of additional homes being built in the borough, secure local economic growth, and jobs in both the local supply chains and on sites.
The council undertook a piece of work to identify barriers that SME developers face and identified finding land, accessing finance, and negotiating the planning process to be key issues.
Therefore, we launched both a developer forum to provide information and access to council services, and an online hub for signposting and advice all in a quest to support these companies.
The Developer Hub brings together the key elements of the development process such as
- Access to land opportunities
- Access to finance
- Support to navigate the planning process and address training and skills needs.
The information in the hub also includes access to the Greater Manchester (GM) Housing Investment Fund, a loan fund operated by the Greater Manchester Combined Authority to support SME developers.
The first SME developer forum was held in February. It brought together 18 small developers who are either from Wigan or have interests in the borough.
We see the value that smaller companies have in terms of supporting local supply chains and employing local people, we also see the value that they can add in terms of bringing forward smaller more difficult housing sites that larger house builders may not be interested in, thus increasing local economic growth and accelerating housing delivery in Wigan.