Housebuilders' pay buoyed by skills shortage

The average pay packet of housebuilding managing directors in London has topped £200,000, new research by Building reveals.

Bosses in the capital now take home an average of £201,000 - a 3% rise on last year - while their peers in Yorkshire and the North-east performed the worst in the regions with an average salary of £138,400 - 45% down on the London figures. The average salary of the housebuilding managing director is £160,580 - up nearly 3% on the £156,000 racked up in 2015.

London performed the best in all the disciplines, which include finance, commercial and project director roles, with average director salaries in the capital rising by 6.3% followed by 5.5% in the South-east. The weakest region was the North-west where salaries increased by just 0.4%.

The research has been carried out by recruitment specialist PSD whose associate director Elliot Course said housebuilders are still facing a shortage of staff, particularly in construction-related roles.

In a sentiment survey carried out last month - three months after the Brexit vote in June - a balance of 75% of respondents identified skills shortages as a threat to their business.

Course said: “Clients did have a pause [after Brexit]. But in most cases now it’s back to business as usual. I have a number of clients with ambitious growth plans. There is still an acute shortage of people.”

Karen Jones, group HR director at listed housebuilder Redrow, confirmed there was a hiatus in recruitment after the EU referendum, but added: “We never stopped recruiting. We looked around but realised it was no different.” Jones said Redrow expects to add a further 15% to its 2,000-strong payroll - although this is down on the 25% it has been growing by in each of the last three years.

And while some starts were paused by London developers in the aftermath of the June vote, many are restarting - with housebuilders hanging on to staff rather than letting them go. Cenkos analyst Kevin Cammack said: “I don’t hear any stories of people being laid off.”

The PSD survey also revealed that the role with the biggest average annual increase was technical director whose pay packets jumped by 4.6% from 2015. Technical directors now earn an average of £93,625.