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MoD plans £1bn property investment bonanza

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Property investment funds are anticipating one of London biggest building bonanzas since the Second World War, as the Ministry of Defence (MoD) plans a massive sell off of 160 acres of land in and around the capital.

The sale of the former military sites, stretching from Uxbridge in west London to Mill Hill and Woolwich in the east, is expected to net the government somewhere in the region of one billion pounds.

Star spot in the sell off goes to the unloved 1960's Chelsea Barracks, presenting property investment firms with the rare opportunity of gaining 13 acres of land in one of the worlds most expensive and desirable post codes, valued at £250 million.

"It's a win-win situation," Mr Clarke told the Guardian as he announced the sale. "Anyone who wants it will have to find the right price to pay for it."

The government is expecting final offers within the next few weeks, with Landways, Britain's largest property investment company, trying to beat off tight competition from St Modwen, the Anglo-French company that now owns Birmingham's former MG Rover site, Longbridge.

St Modwen has joined forces with British construction firm Norwest Holst and Norwest's parent company, French airports and road building company Vinci. The government has insisted that the security of London will be unaffected by the sale, with 1,000 infantry remaining at east London's Woolwich garrison.

Around £50 million of the sale will go towards renovating the Georgian Woolwich barracks.

Mill Hill is likely to be the most hotly contested site after Chelsea, with houses in the area neighbouring the green belt and regularly selling for between £500,000 and one million. Property investment funds looking at the other outlying sites are believed to be offering in the region of £200 million for enough space to construct approximately 4,000 new homes.

While none of the sites has yet been granted planning permission for new home building, property investors are confident that they will be awarded permission at a later date, before selling the land on to specialists home builders.

Other sites under consideration include a small parcel of a few acres neighbouring the remaining historic barracks at Woolwich and Bentley Prior near Harrow, once home to top secret bunkers where the WW2 fighter command planned the battle of Britain.

Further sites include sites at Eastcote and West Ruislip, which both once housed US forces.

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