How Much Is Land Worth Across Charnwood Borough?

We first plot the title against the adopted policies map, Limits to Development, housing or employment allocations, Green Wedges, Areas of Local Separation, conservation areas and other site-specific designations. We then check permissions, appeal decisions, the brownfield register and any made neighbourhood plan. This establishes whether the land is part of the adopted strategy, an adjoining opportunity, a protected gap or presently open countryside.

Eight of the larger allocated sites require an approved masterplan and development brief, design code or equivalent. A landowner within or beside one of those areas may need to coordinate access, schools, open space, drainage and phasing with other owners. Fragmented control or a proposal that prejudices the rest of an allocation can delay delivery and affect value. Our Local Plan allocation guide explains why allocation is important but does not by itself establish a final land price.

The Council’s published 2026 position is that Charnwood can demonstrate approximately 5.01 years of deliverable housing land. That is only just above five years and must be kept under review as the trajectory, delivery rates and national policy change. We examine completions, permissions, stalled sites and the contribution expected from adopted allocations rather than assuming that the borough-wide figure answers the need for a particular settlement or parcel.

A five-year supply figure is not a direct multiplier for land value. A site still needs to be suitably located, available, achievable and technically deliverable. It may offer a useful contingency where an allocation is delayed, or it may compete with a substantial pipeline that reduces short-term market demand. See our guides to the five-year housing land supply and the Housing Delivery Test.

Charnwood’s principal movement corridors include the M1, A6, A46, A512 and A607, together with rail services at Loughborough and several Soar Valley settlements. Those connections can support market demand, but they can also introduce junction pressure, noise, air-quality and severance issues. We check the ability to form a lawful access, visibility, pedestrian and cycle routes, public transport and the cumulative effect of committed development on the local network.

Education capacity, healthcare, foul drainage, water, electricity and strategic highway works can determine when and how much land can be developed. A site that relies on infrastructure controlled by another owner or authority may carry ransom, equalisation or phasing risk. The likely costs must be reflected in residual value rather than added after a headline figure has been quoted. Read our access and highways guide and utilities and infrastructure guide.

Charnwood is not covered by a statutory Green Belt designation. Open land should not therefore be described or valued as Green Belt merely because it is agricultural, greenfield or close to Leicester. The adopted plan instead uses Green Wedges and Areas of Local Separation, together with countryside, settlement-boundary and Local Green Space policies, to protect particular functions and places.

These designations are not interchangeable with Green Belt and the national grey-belt route does not automatically apply to them. We assess the precise purpose of the designation: maintaining settlement identity, preventing coalescence, retaining open character, providing recreation or supporting green infrastructure. Development that materially harms those functions may face strong resistance even where the land is close to an urban area.

The River Soar, River Wreake and their tributaries influence land around Loughborough, Barrow upon Soar, Quorn, Mountsorrel, Sileby and the southern urban fringe. We check fluvial and surface-water flood risk, safe access, drainage outfalls, ordinary watercourses, easements and the space needed for attenuation and exceedance routes. A low-lying field may require substantial non-developable land even where its gross acreage appears attractive.

Hedgerows, mature trees, wetlands, protected species, habitat networks and biodiversity net gain can require buffers and habitat areas. These measures can improve place quality but reduce the saleable area. We therefore value the likely net developable acreage after constraints and infrastructure, not the full title area. See our guides to flood risk and drainage and ecology and development land.

The Charnwood Forest landscape has a distinctive landform, woodland, geology, historic villages and important recreational settings. Elsewhere, the open Soar and Wreake valleys and the approaches to rural settlements create different sensitivities. We review landscape character, settlement views, ancient woodland, trees, designated habitats and whether a defensible boundary could be formed without creating an exposed extension.

Listed buildings, conservation areas, archaeology and the setting of historic parks or village landmarks can reduce density or require larger landscape buffers. Mineral safeguarding and former quarrying or industrial activity can also affect ground conditions and development sequencing. Our heritage and development land guide explains why heritage effects must be assessed before development value is assumed.

Loughborough University, the Science and Enterprise Park, manufacturing, logistics and established local employment areas create demand for more than housing. Commercial or industrial land may have a strong existing-use value, while an occupied site can involve relocation, lease, contamination, noise or access constraints. A residential appraisal should not displace that value unless an alternative use is both lawful and realistically deliverable.

Brownfield status can support regeneration, but it does not remove demolition, remediation, flood, heritage or viability issues. Conversely, a well-located underused site within an urban area may have a clearer route than an apparently unconstrained field outside the settlement strategy. We compare the existing use, alternative uses and planning probability before identifying hope value. See our brownfield register guide and existing-use versus development-value guide.

Charnwood’s adopted Policy H4 seeks 30% affordable housing on major housing developments, with 10% sought on brownfield sites. The Council’s June 2026 Housing SPD also expects adjacent or related parcels to be considered comprehensively so that a site is not artificially divided to avoid policy requirements. Affordable housing, tenure, open space, education, highways and other infrastructure must therefore be built into the appraisal from the outset.

Site-specific abnormal costs can still affect viability, but a reduction in policy provision requires evidence rather than a simple deduction from the land price. We test likely sales values, density, build and infrastructure costs, professional fees, finance, developer return and planning obligations before estimating the residual amount available for land. Our Section 106 and CIL guide explains how planning obligations can affect development-land value.