Selling Land in North Kesteven

• Fields and paddocks adjoining the large villages, from Ruskington, Heckington and Metheringham to Navenby, Branston and Skellingthorpe.
• Land within or against the built edge of medium villages such as Leasingham, Bassingham, Harmston and Welbourn.
• Land on the edges of Sleaford, and in the well connected villages around the town.
• Redundant farmyards, depots and other previously developed sites in the countryside.
• Inherited farmland and larger holdings to put forward to the new Central Lincolnshire plan.

Land on the fen side, close to an airfield or inside one of the quadrants needs more checks first, and we will tell you plainly what they show. When a field passes that first look, the flood, soil, noise, access and design work is paid for by us, under an option with a price set on signing and pitched above the land's present farming value. You keep farming it until completion, and if permission is refused it stays yours and you owe us nothing. Families looking to sell inherited land can read our inherited land 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.

Policy S1 of the Central Lincolnshire Local Plan ranks every settlement, using the number of homes each had at 1 April 2018. The North Kesteven places it names include:

The Village Size Limits No Longer Apply

Policy S4 of the local plan was written to hold unallocated schemes to 10 homes in large and medium villages and 5 in small ones. In October 2026 the planning team published a note on the new national framework which says those limitations will no longer be applied in decision-making, because the new framework gives in-principle support to development within identified settlements, hamlets excepted. Under national policy S4 such a scheme is approved unless the harm would substantially outweigh the benefits. The note keeps the rest of local Policy S4 in use, and that includes its third part: unallocated land immediately adjacent to a village's developed footprint is supported only as a First Homes exception site or a rural affordable housing exception site.

What the Examination Said About Particular Villages

• Leasingham. Land at Meadow Lane lies partly in Flood Zones 2 and 3, and the inspectors cut it to 25 homes to keep them out of the areas at risk.
• Billinghay. On the fen side of the district, they asked for vehicular access to be provided so the village extension would be comprehensive and well planned.
• Heckington and Branston. They found the Heckington site relatively unconstrained and in keeping with the shape of the village, and the Branston site a logical extension beside new housing.
• Bassingham. Its allocations depend on their staying in the made neighbourhood plan.

Most owners selling land for development in North Kesteven own a field or a paddock beside one of these villages, and for that kind of site the shape of the built edge, flood zones and access now count for more than a numerical cap. Our flood risk guide explains how the zones are tested.

The two extensions on Lincoln's southern side are North Kesteven's to decide. The joint monitoring report gives the latest position on each:

1. South East Quadrant, Bracebridge Heath and Canwick Heath. One outline permission, 20/0057/OUT for up to 1,087 homes, was granted on 4 April 2023. Linden Homes has built out a first phase of 132 homes, Taylor Wimpey submitted reserved matters for 450 homes north of Canwick Avenue in July 2024, and roundabout and servicing works began in February 2025.
2. South West Quadrant, North Hykeham. Around 2,000 homes, about 5 hectares of employment land, a primary school and a local centre, alongside a large contribution to the North Hykeham Relief Road. A first phase of 167 homes was approved in October 2018, and the relief road gained permission on 13 May 2024.
3. The concept plan rule. In March 2025 the council repeated that the South West Quadrant needs a broad concept plan and design code, and that proposals coming before it is agreed, other than inconsequential ones, will not be supported.

Living Beside RAF Waddington

Waddington is a large village with an air base on its doorstep. When the inspectors accepted the allocation at NK/WAD/015, bounded on two sides by homes then being built, they called it a logical and sound extension and noted that the policy requirements would ensure any scheme properly assesses its proximity to RAF Waddington. They also recorded that most brownfield sites in the Central Lincolnshire countryside are Ministry of Defence land, and that previous development alone does not justify wholesale support.

So a field near Waddington, Harmston or Bracebridge Heath begins with two checks: whether it falls inside the quadrant land, where the masterplan governs, and how close it lies to the airfield. Owners selling greenfield land in this part of the district usually find those answers set the scale of what can be built.

The Housing Delivery Test 2025 measures the City of Lincoln, North Kesteven and West Lindsey together, as the Central Lincolnshire Local Plan area, and records 4,544 homes built against 3,219 required, a result of 141%. That result belongs to the plan area as a whole, not to North Kesteven on its own. The joint supply report of October 2025 likewise finds 7.1 years for the whole plan area at 31 March 2025, against the adopted Central Lincolnshire Local Plan requirement of 1,102 homes a year across the City of Lincoln, North Kesteven and West Lindsey, plus a 5% buffer, and gives no separate figure for North Kesteven.

What the report does show is how much of the area's building happens here:

Across those seven years North Kesteven built about 47% of the plan area's homes. The council's own monitoring report for 2024/25 puts that year at 556 net, from 567 gross completions less 11 demolitions and other losses, ten fewer than the joint table; the joint monitoring report records a single demolition in the district that year, so the two appear to count losses differently. Of the 556, 227 were affordable homes, or 40.8%, and the council collected £955,035 of Community Infrastructure Levy in the year.

Why the Joint Position Matters Beyond a Village

Out in the countryside, homes rely on national policy S5, which needs evidence of unmet need, a field well related to the village or town, and roads, schools and drainage with room to serve it. A shortfall in five-year supply would count as evidence for a decision maker to weigh, never as a finding in itself, while a delivery result under 75% would mean need is taken as shown. With the plan area at 7.1 years of land and a joint result of 141%, neither applies across Central Lincolnshire, and the October 2026 note adds that, where a plan adopted within the last five years shows five years of land and a delivery result above 75%, the framework does not treat that as evidence of unmet need for five years from adoption.

In practice that makes the village tier and the developed footprint the main routes for now, with the new plan for larger land. The same note says that where the local plan is silent, as it is on some flexibility national policy S5 allows for previously developed land, the national policy takes primacy, which can help a redundant yard or farmstead in the countryside. Our brownfield and yards page shows what we mean.