New village homes to boost Shropshire property market
Proposals to build houses in two Shropshire villages will boost the 'severely depressed' property market and provide much needed affordable homes, developers behind the plans have said.
Two separate bids for houses at Babbinswood near Whittington and at Selattyn, both near Oswestry, have been lodged with Shropshire Council.
The Whittington plans, submitted by applicants R Bladen and Sons, would see six homes built in the village.
Papers lodged in support of the bid claim the only way that the village can accommodate new open-market development is through small scale extensions to the current development boundary.
The plans add: "The local and national housing market is severely depressed at the moment, and as a result, most new housing developments are simply not currently viable.
"There is also a particularly limited supply of new housing sites in the Oswestry area, owing to the fact that the adopted Local Plan was published some 14 years ago, and the vast majority of allocated housing sites have now been developed.
"Because the application site is owned by an established local builder, the proposed development will actually be built in the short term, adding to the available supply of new homes locally."
The planning statement added that if permission was granted £70,000 would be made towards local affordable housing projects and £72,500 will be paid through the Community Infrastructure Levy. It adds that a proportion of the CIL funding could be used for the provision of speed warning signs on the approaches to the village.
The plans for Selattyn by applicant Mr AE Hughes would see six houses build near Gyrn Road in the village.
The proposal comprises one affordable three bedroom home and five open market properties.
Papers lodged in support of that bid say: "This mix has been proposed to provide two larger units to provide financial viability to the proposal with the three smaller-scale properties which could be seen to be more 'affordable' for first-time buyers.
"At present, the majority of units in Selattyn are large detached units which unfortunately push younger residents of the community to rent/purchase properties in other areas such as Oswestry."
The plans would include a contribution of about £55,000 to community infrastructure improvements, the papers say.
