Selling Land in Rushcliffe

• Yards, depots, former commercial sites and other previously developed land in the Green Belt.
• Small gaps within the built fabric of a village, suited to infilling.
• Plots and underused land within West Bridgford and the key settlements.
• Fields on the edge of Bingham, Radcliffe on Trent, Keyworth, Ruddington, Cotgrave or East Leake that are contained by roads, a railway or existing homes.
• Larger holdings that could be assessed for the new Local Plan, inside or outside the Green Belt.

Open Green Belt that plainly checks the spread of Nottingham faces a high bar, and we will tell you so in our review. Where a site suits us, we set the price with you at the outset, above today's value, and we fund the Green Belt, highways, drainage and ecology work ourselves. You carry on using the land until completion, and if permission never comes it remains yours, with nothing owed. Old yards and commercial plots have their own page, brownfield and yards, and the how it works page takes you through the stages.

• 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.

Because the Core Strategy is more than five years old, the council measures its supply against the standard method rather than the plan. Its five-year housing land supply assessment, published in February 2026 with a base date of 31 March 2025, sets out:

The large sites carry much of that supply. The assessment counts 1,265 homes in five years at land south of Clifton, now known as Fairham, 356 north of Bingham, 330 on the second phase at former RAF Newton, 296 at Melton Road, Edwalton, and 178 off Mill Lane in Cotgrave, but only 70 at the largest allocation, east of Gamston and north of Tollerton.

Building has been strong but is easing. The council's monitoring report for 2024/25 records 1,150 net completions in 2022/23, 1,110 in 2023/24 and 887 in 2024/25, of which 226 were affordable homes.

For an owner selling land in Rushcliffe, a margin that thin means the position could change with one statement, and having the evidence prepared before it does is what lets a site move quickly.

Two Reasons the Next Figure Could Be Tighter

We would not predict the result, but two published numbers bear on the margin. The council's scoping document of September 2026 gives a standard method need of about 890 homes a year. On the council's own count of 4,676 homes, five years at 890 plus the 5% buffer would need about 4,673, leaving almost nothing to spare. Second, the inspectors examining the joint plan have capped delivery at land south of Clifton at 220 homes a year. The assessment counts 1,265 homes from that site in five years, more than the 1,100 such a cap would allow. Each next statement also adds new permissions and a year of building, so neither point settles the answer, but together they explain why we watch Rushcliffe's next statement closely.

The joint plan now covers Broxtowe, Nottingham and Rushcliffe to 2041, and in Rushcliffe it would replace the Core Strategy. Gedling withdrew from the partnership after the national framework was updated during the publication consultation of November 2024, and its land is no longer part of it. A revised publication draft followed in March 2025, and the three councils submitted the plan on 22 December 2025.

The examination is before three inspectors, and hearings closed on 23 July 2026. In a post-hearing note on housing supply, the inspectors cut expected delivery at Toton and Chetwynd Barracks in Broxtowe by 195 homes, agreed that the former Stanton Tip should be deleted, and capped land south of Clifton at 220 homes a year. The councils' response of 16 September 2026 re-ran the figures for Rushcliffe:

The supply rows need reading with care. On adoption, Rushcliffe's supply would be tested against the plan's requirement of 664 a year rather than today's 873, and the councils' own sums give 5.85 years. But the plan is being examined under the December 2023 framework, and 664 is about 76% of the 873 a year behind today's supply statement. A national rule in force for decisions since 1 July 2026 raises the buffer to 20% when three things line up: the requirement was adopted within five years, it was tested under a pre-December 2024 framework, and it sits at or below four fifths of the standard method. With 20% rather than 5%, the same 4,076 homes against 3,984 required would leave just over five years, a margin of 92 homes, almost exactly today's. Adoption is therefore unlikely to open up a comfortable cushion for decisions on applications, and the grey belt need test would stay finely balanced.

Gamston and Tollerton

The largest allocation, around 4,000 homes east of Gamston and north of Tollerton, has been in the plan since 2014. In March 2026 the council's Cabinet approved a supplementary planning document for the whole site, after pausing in January for more detail from the applicants, especially on highways, which it says gave it an aligned approach to a single highways solution. Planning applications are in, and the council says concerns about possible contamination around Nottingham Airport must be dealt with through them. Cllr Roger Upton said that without the guidance the council "would have risked applications for homes on the site at Gamston and Tollerton being determined by Government rather than by local people".

For an owner selling land near Gamston or Tollerton, the lesson of that guidance is that highways come first, and a site that can show a workable access early is easier to take forward.

The new plan starts with scoping. The scoping consultation had a closing time of 5pm on 23 October 2026, and the council's timetable set the publication of its Gateway 1 self-assessment for 31 October. The call for sites follows later. Land with its evidence in hand when that call opens is best placed for the plan content stage in May 2027.

A Joint Plan Near Its End, and a Supply Margin to Watch

The examination page says further information on next steps will follow, and main modifications would normally go out for comment before the inspectors report. The councils' figures assumed adoption at the end of 2026. Once the joint plan is adopted, Rushcliffe's supply would be measured against its requirement, with the 20% buffer described above, so the margin for decisions would stay narrow rather than widen.

Supply is the figure to watch. The last assessment came out in February 2026, based at 31 March 2025. The next will add a year of building and new permissions, read against the higher need figure and the Clifton cap. A result below five years would give well placed land, including grey belt, an evidenced need it lacks now, and we would want to be ready.

The delivery test runs yearly too, and the Housing Delivery Test 2025 arrived on 17 August 2026. The next window drops 2022/23, the borough's strongest recent year at 1,150 homes, and adds 2025/26. At 172%, none of the test's consequences is close.

Reorganisation is paused. On 7 September 2026 the government paused the Nottingham and Nottinghamshire reorganisation while it reviews the programme. Rushcliffe remains the planning authority for both plans.

Settlement Sites Now, Green Belt Fields for the Call for Sites

• Previously developed land, village infill and sites within settlements can be looked at now.
• Green Belt fields are best prepared for the call for sites and the May 2027 consultation, with the council's grey belt framework in mind.