Morning,

So for the sake of clarity I am land a development consultant working on my own for the last 13 years, before that 20 years working for Housebuilders and home owners to realise their property goals.

For years, it has been standard practice to trawl the OS maps in search of plots that may have development potential and write to the owners enquiring whether they are interested in selling. Mostly unsuccessful, a couple of clients stated that their response rate is 1:100!

What has lead to me posting this is my parents sit on a large plot of land that screams development and without fail they get about 4-5 letters a year from developers. So i wondered if this is common place around the country or is it a South East phenomenon.

But also as a guilty party in this practice i wanted to better understand peoples view on receiving such a letter.

I suppose i want to gauge people opinions and see if there is a better way to reach people rather than this intrusive and quite frankly old fashioned way.

Be gentle! i appreciate developers are not the most popular of professions but we all need homes. And my first passion is Landrovers!

Thanks

I don’t think it would worry me. Having said that, whilst having lived in some decent sized houses over the years , they’ve all been in or around London, so there doesn’t tend to be much scope for development.

This could all change in a few weeks when I’m moving up north to Bedfordshire
Buying a listed cottage that sits on a large piece of land. The land was a separate purchase by the current owner which isn’t listed, so I could be contacted in the future.

But I’ve no intention to sell to developers, I’m still just about young enough to maintain the land, but old enough to have the time

Sounds perfect good luck with the move, let me know if those letters come in lol

There is a plot across the road from us, the owners suggest they get 4/5 letters or notes a month pushed through enquiring about the land and almost begging to buy it and that’s only a single plot! They have put up fences and tried to make it look likes it’s more part of their house which is next door so it’s essentially boxed in now. Sold - Bell a 2015 MY16 Loire Blue Autobiography 4.4 SDV8
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As a 30 year veteran of the property world, I can confirm this is normal practice. As well as writing, many agents make contact directly with the landowners having traced their phone number and enter into a dialogue which can take years; some of my most successful colleagues spent years getting to know people and became trusted advisers so that when the offers come in, they make sure the best deal for that landowner is done. Some people dislike the direct approach, so you apologise for troubling them and move on, but more often than not they will come back to you for advice when other less thoughtful operators start hassling.

Nice to meet a fellow property guy, I have been doing it for years now and always astonished by the response rate, especially these days when an email is easy to do to say no.

As you say and my parents taught me always be polite! Your not wrong, i had written to one house over the space of twenty years from various housebuilders then finally when i started my own business, i wrote one last time 5 years later she called me and she had kept all the letters!

As you say the opportunity to be patient and build trust is key.

I see no problem with a polite personalised letter. A round robin would be binned. Filters are in fact so good that in certain circumstances, when the ambient air is already polluted, a diesel car will tend to extract more particles from the air than it emits. Emissions Analytics worked with........etc etc

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Bill

Thanks for your comment i think thats the key, it costs to get homeowner information, not alot but if your sending out alot of letters it stacks up.

But if you know who your writing to it must be better than Dear Sirs or Dear Homeowner?

We've got a fair bit of land - been here for 15 years and never had a letter. I suspect its because historically PP for anything in Somerset is almost impossible and always a fight. You property guys presumably know that and therefore don't bother. We've not tried for the last 10 years or so (tried a bit before that), but I know things have changed a bit nationally so maybe it will be poss in the future. I'm not upset by unsolicited letters if they have something interesting to say, particularly if personalised to me, but so few do have anything intersesting to say that they just get into the recycle bin within seconds. Mike - MPx

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I got a letter several months ago, insinuating they were local.
Immediately smelt scam, as phone code's was all Tyneside 0191 --250 miles away.

Binned the letter as I have several 100 year old oaks on a TPO and the council will never allow any building work, so knew they were just looking at simple plans of plots in the village and assuming ripe for development.

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MPx wrote:

We've got a fair bit of land - been here for 15 years and never had a letter. I suspect its because historically PP for anything in Somerset is almost impossible and always a fight. You property guys presumably know that and therefore don't bother. We've not tried for the last 10 years or so (tried a bit before that), but I know things have changed a bit nationally so maybe it will be poss in the future. I'm not upset by unsolicited letters if they have something interesting to say, particularly if personalised to me, but so few do have anything intersesting to say that they just get into the recycle bin within seconds.