Development Finance
Leeds

Leeds: housing targets and supply

Leeds City Council is the planning authority. Its adopted Core Strategy, as amended by the Core Strategy Selective Review and adopted on 11 September 2019, covers 2017 to 2033 with a net housing requirement of 51,952 homes, and the Site Allocations Plan was adopted on 17 January 2024. A new Leeds Local Plan 2040 is being prepared for 2022 to 2040.

The council's five-year housing land supply statement, with a base date of 1 April 2025, uses the government's standard method for local housing need, giving an annual requirement of 3,896 homes from April 2025. With a 5% buffer the five-year requirement works out at 4,091 homes a year, and the council reports a supply of 6.4 years. Net delivery between 1 April 2017 and 31 March 2025 was 26,993 homes.

Sales values for a Leeds appraisal

The index is only a starting point for GDV, but it frames the numbers. Leeds' averages for July 2026: £152,000 for a flat, £206,000 terraced, £271,000 semi-detached, £455,000 detached; semi-detached prices rose 4.7% while flat prices were around the same as a year earlier.

A block of eight flats at the flat average works out at roughly £1.22 million of GDV, and four detached houses at roughly £1.82 million. A valuer will want new-build comparables, which often differ from these second-hand figures, before the lender fixes the facility.

If the plan is to hold and let, or to sell to an investor, rents set the value instead. Leeds rents averaged £1,145 a month in August 2026: £782 for one bedroom, £975 for two and £1,138 for three. Eight two-bedroom flats at that rent would gross about £93,600 a year before costs and voids.

Test your own figures with the residual land value calculator and the LTGDV and ROCE calculator.

England: tax, funding and building rules

Leeds City Council can attach section 106 obligations and charge the Community Infrastructure Levy where it has adopted one, and the land itself pays Stamp Duty Land Tax; all three belong in a Leeds appraisal. Homes England, the government's housing agency, is on our panel and lends to smaller housebuilders on schemes of five or more homes in England; see our Homes England review.

Development lenders for Leeds schemes

49 lenders on our panel lend development finance for schemes in Leeds. You can see who they are further down this page. We check each lender's appetite for the exact address and property before putting your case forward.

Most release build costs in stages after a monitoring surveyor's visit, with interest rolled up and repaid from sales or a refinance; a development exit loan can repay the build lender if units take longer to sell.

Development finance in Leeds: questions