Selling Land in Bolsover

• Plots, backland and redundant buildings inside the envelopes of Bolsover, Shirebrook, Clowne and South Normanton.
• Former works, depots and yards anywhere in the district, including around Barlborough in the Green Belt.
• Fields of 2 acres or more against the envelope of a town or large village, such as Tibshelf, Pinxton, Whitwell or Creswell, for an application now or for the next plan.
• Land within an easy walk of Shirebrook, Creswell, Whitwell or Langwith-Whaley Thorns station.
• Larger holdings near the M1 junctions that could serve the higher need figure the next plan must meet.

With a shortfall of 71 homes, officers warning their committee of more applications to come, and a plan still years away, the early evidence decides which sites stand out: access, drainage, ecology, heritage and, near Barlborough, the Green Belt case. We carry out and pay for all of it. Our option is agreed at a fixed price from the start, set above what the land is worth today, you go on using the land, and if permission never comes you keep it and owe us nothing. The steps are set out on our how it works page.

• An outright sale. You sell the land as it stands today, privately or at auction. The price is what a buyer will pay for it without planning permission, and the buyer takes on everything that follows.
• A conditional contract. You agree a sale now, but it only completes if planning permission is granted. Until then you keep the land, and the agreement sets out who applies for permission and who pays.
• An option agreement, the route we use. We agree your price at the start, in writing, set above what your land is worth today. We then pay for and run all of the planning work, at our own cost and risk. If permission is granted, we complete the purchase and you receive the agreed price on completion. If it is not, you keep your land and owe nothing.

For land that needs planning permission before it is worth more, an option means you know your price before any work starts and never spend a penny on planning. The ways to sell land for development, compared sets out each route in full.

The plan set a floor of 272 homes a year. Once it passed its fifth birthday in March 2025, national policy required the council to test its supply against local housing need under the standard method instead, because the council's review found the plan needed updating, in large part because of the steep rise in housing need targets. The annual position statement at 1 April 2026, taken to planning committee on 8 July 2026, sets out the result:

The move to the new method was not a cliff edge at first. When the December 2024 changes arrived, a January 2025 report to planning committee re-ran the sums at April 2024 against 353 homes a year, 371 with the buffer, and still found 6.12 years. Two years on, need has risen to 368 a year, and the supply counted has not kept pace. The council used the housing stock figures released in May 2026 for the calculation, and says that switch alone added 3 homes a year, or 15 over five years.

A Supply That Runs Ahead, Then Falls Behind

The statement expects deliveries well above the 386 a year needed in each of the first three years, then below it in 2029/30 and 2030/31, so the shortfall builds at the back of the period. The list of major sites behind the figure shows where the homes come from. Bolsover town carries most of them, 966 of the 1,583 homes expected from major sites in the five years. The largest contributions:

• Land between Welbeck Road and Oxcroft Lane, later phases. 449 of its 547 homes within the five years, starting in 2027/28.
• Land south west of Brockley Wood, Oxcroft Lane. All 161 homes, not yet started.
• Land off Langwith Road and Mooracre Lane, phase 2. 155 of 217 homes, with 62 left for later.
• Outside the town, land south of the Model Village in Creswell. 36 homes a year, 180 in all, with 101 beyond 2031.

How Officers Are Applying It

In May 2026, before the new statement, officers recommending refusal of a static caravan on countryside land at Carr Vale still wrote that the council is able to demonstrate a five-year housing land supply and that there was no basis for the tilted balance. The July report changed that. Officers told the committee that the council is not able to demonstrate five years for 2026/27 to 2030/31, that any refusal must rest on sound and demonstrable harm, and that the shortfall may lead to more speculative applications on countryside beyond the development envelopes, where a refusal may be overturned at appeal. They added that those applications could also help the council regain five years.

The report also looked ahead to policies S4 and S5 in the government's December 2025 draft framework, which the August 2026 framework now applies. With a gap of 71 homes, the quality of a site and how well it sits against its settlement will carry most of the weight.

Selling land for development in Bolsover today therefore comes down to the site itself: how it sits against the envelope of the town or village beside it, and whether the roads and drainage can take the homes.

Delivery at 205% rules out the delivery test as a route, but a supply of 4.82 years opens national policy routes that were closed in Bolsover a year ago. How each kind of land is treated:

1. Inside a development envelope. Plots, backland and redundant commercial sites within Bolsover, Shirebrook, Clowne, South Normanton and the villages fall under policy S4 of the August 2026 framework, which tilts towards granting permission and keeps refusal for cases where the harm substantially exceeds what the scheme brings. This is the most open route in the district today.
2. Countryside outside the envelopes. Policy S5 of the national framework supports homes beyond a settlement edge where housing need is shown to be going unmet, for land that relates well to the place beside it and where local services can take the growth. A supply short of five years is the usual evidence, and Bolsover now has one. It is evidence to be weighed against policy SS9 and any harm, not an automatic finding, so a field that sits properly against Tibshelf, Pinxton or Whitwell has a case to make, while one cut off from the village by open land still does not.
3. Green Belt around Barlborough and Clowne. S5 does not apply in the Green Belt. Grey belt, meaning Green Belt land that does little for Green Belt purposes, can take housing only where need is evidenced, typically by a supply below five years or a delivery result under 75%. The first of those now applies here, so the grey belt test is open, though the land itself must still qualify, and larger schemes would also face the Golden Rules, which set requirements for affordable housing, infrastructure and public green space.
4. Previously developed land. Former works, depots and yards with lawful buildings or hardstanding have their own routes in national policy, including inside the Green Belt, whatever the supply position. Farm buildings do not count.

The Green Belt picture may not stay fixed. The council's April 2025 Local Development Scheme report names changes to Green Belt policy as one of the two reasons the plan must be updated, alongside higher housing need, and says a new Green Belt review will be required in the immediate term. The grey belt guide sets out what such a review tests.

If your land lies around Barlborough or Clowne, whether it counts as grey belt is the first question to settle, and our free review answers it before anything is agreed.

Until the council publishes its next statement, with a base date of 1 April 2027, 4.82 years is its own figure and the one applications are weighed against. Several things will shape the next one: the year's completions, the permissions granted in the meantime, including on the speculative applications officers said could help the council regain five years, and the government's need figure, which moves each year with the latest housing stock and affordability data. Each new statement also drops a strong year from the front and adds one at the back, and the 2026 statement already shows its later years below need. The gap could close or widen; which of the two, we do not predict.

Far Above the Delivery Thresholds, and a Paused Derbyshire North

The Housing Delivery Test 2025, issued on 17 August 2026 and repeated every year, tells another story. At 205%, Bolsover sits a long way above every threshold. A result under 95% would call for an action plan, under 85% would add a 20% buffer to the supply sums, and under 75% would treat unmet need as established, so the test offers no route here while delivery holds up.

Reorganisation is the other unknown. On 16 July 2026 the government decided to place Bolsover in a new Derbyshire North Council with Chesterfield, North East Derbyshire, High Peak, Derbyshire Dales and the north of Amber Valley, due to begin in April 2028. On 7 September 2026 it paused that decision for a review, with no timescale for the outcome, and confirmed that elections in May 2027 will go ahead on existing boundaries. Since the district's own plan work is not due to begin until June 2027, whichever council ends up preparing the plan will inherit the higher need figure and the Green Belt review the district has said it needs.

Envelope and Edge Land Now, Green Belt Tested as Grey Belt

• Land inside an envelope, and previously developed land, can be looked at now, as neither depends on the supply figure.
• Open fields that sit well against a settlement edge can be looked at now under S5 while the shortfall stands, and are worth preparing for the 2027 consultation in any case.
• Green Belt land near Barlborough and Clowne can be tested as grey belt now, with the council's Green Belt review as the longer route.