When the going gets tough, the tough keep going

You can view his piece on the London First website too.

2020 has been a uniquely disruptive year for the construction and development industry, from site shutdowns seriously impacting construction logistics and in-person sales events having to be cancelled to banks becoming increasingly cautious about lending. Stability and security have become a rarity in our industry, and as we move towards 2021 it’s unclear what lies ahead. 

Anyone who’s familiar with the Mount Anvil approach will know that partnerships are the lifeblood of our business. And whilst 2020 has thrown up plenty of uncertainty, our relentless focus on our long-standing relationships has not changed. In fact, despite the challenging economic backdrop, we’ve had a bumper year from a financing perspective – securing  almost £150m of funding via our financial partnerships in 2020. 

So how does that work, exactly? Fundamentally, it boils down to our exceptionally strong sales performance.  By that, I mean how quickly and early we sell homes rather than how much we sell them for – although 2020 has also been an exceptional year for us in terms of achieving and exceeding target sales revenues with and for our joint venture partners.

Our JV partners tell us they value our ability to deliver cash back into their business at pace, which they can then reinvest in new affordable housing projects. Because we choose to focus on just six to eight schemes at any one point, we’re able to pool and focus our resources on delivering a rapid sales velocity for our partners. 

It’s not just our partners and financial institutions that are investing with us for that reason.  £50m of funding was approved by Sadiq Khan as part of the Mayor’s commitment to helping London’s construction and housing sector bounce back from the COVID-19 crisis. In addition, we secured a £99m commitment from NatWest for our Silk District scheme with L&Q and our Three Waters schem with Peabody. These were the latest in a long-standing funding partnership with the bank.

Our tie-up with GLA Land and Property is the first of its kind involving a private sector developer. It will allow us to accelerate construction of high quality homes and acquire more sites in joint venture partnerships with local authorities and housing associations, delivering increased amounts of affordable housing on those schemes.

We’ve built our business and our reputation around a commitment to creating a positive legacy, quality developments that people are proud to call home, and partnerships that all involved want to repeat. We’ve weathered recessions and unpredictable markets before, and we put this down to our prioritisation of people, places and then profit. So, as some flee the city in search of bigger profit margins, we’re still all in on London.