Legal & General is expanding its retirement housing portfolio by acquiring a seven-acre site in South East England.
Inspired Villages Group (IVG), established by L&G in August 2017, has bought Ledian Farm, Leeds Village in Kent.
The site, which comes with planning consent for a retirement village, is expected to have a gross development value in excess of £50m (€56.5m) and provide over 115 homes when built.
The acquisition of Ledian Farm further expands IVG’s national footprint, which is currently arranged over six village schemes, located in Warwickshire, Cheshire, West Sussex, Devon and Hampshire, as it looks to satisfy the growing demand for later living communities.
The development of Ledian Farm will increase IVG’s property portfolio to over 1,100 apartments and forms part of its plan to expand its property portfolio to 3,500.
Jamie Bunce, the CEO of IVG, said: ”Ledian Farm is the 7th site secured by Inspired Villages since its formation with Legal & General in August 2017.
Due to the scarcity of high-quality stock in the UK’s later living housing market, IVG recognises that the main path to scaling its business is through organic growth, Bunce said.
“We are working on a significant number of exciting opportunities across the UK to further add to the growing portfolio of Inspired Villages in 2018.”
Phil Bayliss, the head of later living at Legal & General Capital, said: “Combined with the best in class management team at IVG, Legal & General’s long-term investment in this sector will bring the necessary scale of supply to what is currently the most underserved sector of the housing market.
”The acquisition of Renaissance Villages in November 2017 and Ledian Farm in quick succession is testament to our aggressive growth objectives for the Later Living business.”
