County Durham house builder takes on its first 'large-scale residential development'

Regional housebuilder Banks Homes has chosen its home county as the location for its first large-scale residential development.

The County Durham-headquartered firm is set to build up to 150 new homes on a seven-hectare site at Station Road in West Rainton. And as part of the project, long-awaited improvements will be made to the West Rainton and Pittington Lane junctions of the A690, with Durham County Council installing new traffic signalling and a new pedestrian crossing expected to be complete by the summer.

The West Rainton site, which already has been granted detailed planning permission, will see 120 three-to-five bedroomed family homes being built, as well as an allocation of 30 affordable homes, which will include two and three bedroomed houses and two-bedroomed bungalows.

The consented scheme includes a new community hub, a play area, new landscaped areas and new areas of public open space will also be developed. Banks Homes expects to be working on site by the autumn, with a view to the first of the new homes being available to buy in early 2024.

Launched by North East employer The Banks Group earlier this year, Banks Homes is a dedicated regional housebuilding business that is focusing on sites of all sizes across North East England and Yorkshire.

It operates independently, but alongside, Banks’ existing property development arm, Banks Property, and is looking to both acquire sites from other developers and identify its own market opportunities.

Work on its first project, an executive development of nine luxury homes in the centre of the prestigious Mount Oswald site in Durham City, is scheduled to start in the coming months.

The family firm will be looking to make substantial investments in the North East economy by working with a series of expert contractors on the construction of each new residential development.

Russ Hall, managing director at Banks Homes, says: “The West Rainton site offers us the opportunity to start working at scale quickly and we’re excited to be announcing our plans for delivering this high quality, low density development in our home county.

“We know that the planned improvements to the A690 junctions are a real priority for the local community and they are also an essential part of the realisation of this project. The Banks Group’s longstanding policy is to invest in the expertise of local businesses wherever possible for all of its projects and we’ll be looking to take the same approach at West Rainton.

“Banks Homes is looking to quickly build a strong pipeline of projects across the North East and Yorkshire which will contribute directly to meeting the pressing need to improve and increase the housing supply in these areas, and West Rainton will provide a clear example of how the business’s ambitions will be realised on the ground.”

By Mark Adair – Correspondent, Bdaily

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