Welcome to Thorverton Community Land Trust

PROJECT UPDATE APRIL 2026

The highlight of the month was the attendance of the April Open Meeting by Ms Jo Petford of Hastoe, our Housing Association partner.  Jo was able to introduce Hastoe www.hastoe.com to the thirty or so that attended the meeting and there were also some presentations from the CLT team before the question and answer session.

In summary the meeting confirmed several important points.  Firstly the CLT project is the only development in Thorverton that will be able to offer properties for social rent, usually at 50-60% of the local open market levels; this is a considerably better than so called affordable rent rates which are usually at 80% and what is generally offered by a private developer.  Social rental properties will make up the majority of the Hastoe plan for 15 homes on the Silver St site, with the remainder being for shared ownership.  (Useful glossary of the different types of affordable housing is shown here)

The criteria for prioritising potential occupants were also discussed.  Firstly, Jo Petford made it clear that all applicants need to be registered with Devon Home Choice as this is the only route that Hastoe will use.  Secondly, the CLT emphasised its aim to ensure local people were given priority; this can be broadly divided into three categories – people that live in or have a strong local connection to Thorverton, people that work in the area, or people that have dependants that live in the area.  Within these three there are further ground rules that will be part of the S106 agreement that will ensure local people are first in the line.  More details about this will be placed on the website as they are agreed.

PROJECT UPDATE MARCH 2026

Not long now until the next Open Meeting on Thursday 16^th April at 7.00pm in the Memorial Hall.  Please come along and meet Hastoe, the housing association that will be our partner, who will be able to answer questions about their proposals.  (NB another meeting will be held later in the summer when details of the scheme will be shown.)

In March the CLT held another of their regular meetings with all the parties involved in this project – Hastoe, MDDC and Savills, who represent the Church Commissioners.  At the latest meeting the CLT proposed that all potential developments on the southern site should be put on hold, until further notice.  The ultimate aim of the CLT is to build Affordable Housing in Thorverton; as we edge closer to completing a deal to purchase the northern site we did not want any plans for the south to distract attention from the prime target.  By reaching this decision we ensure that the Church Commissioners can concentrate on the emerging Hastoe proposals; we also get the added benefit of making it easier for MDDC to allocate their grant by concentrating on one site.

Hastoe has told us that they expect to build about 15 homes, the majority of which will be for social rent with about three for shared ownership.  Shelving the southern site plans for the moment means the CLT will fall short of the Housing Needs Survey target of 19 and will not be able to continue with the ‘starter homes’ (DMS - Discounted Market Sale) project for the moment.

The CLT are only too aware of other potential sites being developed in the village.  We want to emphasise that the CLT is the only project that focuses on providing Affordable Housing for local people.  The CLT project is being supported by the Church Commissioners and is said to be in the vanguard of projects responding to the recent ‘Coming Home’ report from the Archbishops of Canterbury and York.  The CLT also has the backing of the Planning Dept at MDDC.

PROJECT UPDATE JAN-FEB 2026

The CLT recently set up regular 4 way meetings with all the main parties involved in the project– the Church Commissioners who are the landowners (via their agents, Savills), Hastoe Group who are the Housing Association and MDDC Planning.

We have held two of these meetings in Dec and Jan, and here is a basic summary:

Hastoe Group has visited the site with an architect and is completing their final internal reports on the viability of the scheme.  Once this has been confirmed the Church Commissioners will still need to see the project get to the Planning Application stage before they can consider releasing the land for sale to the CLT.  The grant from MDDC that will fund this is still currently available, but a new time limit on its use will have to be set.  While the CLT still expects all of these pieces of the jigsaw to fall into place in the correct order at the correct time, these is still a lot of work to be done.

The CLT cannot confirm a completion date for this project at the moment, but be warned that it is still sometime away; if it’s any consolation to the village we have been told we are ahead of the usual timetable for such projects.  Please bear with us and continue to support us.

OPEN MEETING - Weds 26th Nov 2025

The latest CLT Open Meeting was held on Weds 26th Nov; more that 40 members of the public turned out on a rather wet and windy winter evening.  Presentations were made by the CLT Board of Andrew Foster, Andrew Saunders and Andrew Wiles and full details can be found here.  Mr John Hammond, a senior manager in Mid Devon CCs Planning Dept was present and although he did not make a presentation he was able to answer questions.

A Q+A session followed and full details of this can be seen here.

The evening ended with the audience being asked two questions -

Should the Board keep pressing on with the Affordable Housing on the north side, working with Hastoe to build up to 19 homes?

Should the Board keep up the work with the Church Commissioners, through Savills, to secure the land on the south side for the village with a view to building starter homes and down-sizing homes there?

The response to both questions was a resounding 'yes'.