Housebuilder says it has received extra £50m under government scheme to support construction of new homes

Housebuilder Persimmon saw its forward sales into 2010 leap by 40% from the same time last year, after it was granted funding from the Homes and Communities Agency for Kickstart 2.


Persimmon

The Kickstart Housing Delivery programmes was announced in the 2009 budget, and was targeted at stalled sites to support the construction of high quality, mixed tenure housing developments.

The group revealed today that it had been allocated an additional £50m under the scheme, to support potential purchasers of Persimmon homes.

Under the HomeBuy Direct process, this will provide assistance to first time buyers for around 3,000 homes on about 40 Persimmon developments across England between now and 2012.

Persimmon said the emphasis on creating more traditional housing for families had been a “great benefit to the business”, and that its forward order sales had risen to £640m.

The group admitted the market had remained challenging since April 2008, but said it had achieved a reduction in debt from £1.2bn in April 2008, down to around £270m at the end of 2009.