Selling Land in Walsall

• Yards, works, depots and older commercial buildings in Walsall, Willenhall, Darlaston and Bloxwich.
• Garage courts, backland and large gardens across the borough's suburbs.
• Fields on the edge of Aldridge, Brownhills, Pelsall, Rushall and Streetly that sit against existing homes, roads or canals.
• Previously developed land in the Green Belt, such as former nurseries, depots or works with lawful buildings.
• Farmland or inherited land in the east of the borough, whether or not it was put forward in 2024.

In Walsall the case for a field rests on its own Green Belt assessment at the scale of the site, alongside access, ecology, drainage and the canal network. We pay for that evidence and the application, under an option whose price is settled with you at the outset and pitched above the land's present value. The land stays yours to use until completion, and if permission is refused, you keep it and owe us nothing. Our farmland page describes the open land we take on, and the brownfield and yards page the urban sites.

• 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 council's land supply statement of November 2025 measures the position at 1 April 2025. With the Core Strategy more than five years old, the yardstick is the standard method, 1,172 homes a year, plus a 20% buffer, the buffer applying because delivery in the 2023 test was "only 48% of the requirement". The government's revised standard method lifted the yearly need from 906 homes a year earlier to 1,172, so a supply the council's 2024 assessment had called "only sufficient for three years" now covers about two:

The council's statement also says plainly what it leaves out: "the current known supply, excluding sites in the Green Belt, is well below the five year requirement". Its table lists the Green Belt land as further potential, on which it "assumed that none are deliverable within 5 years": sites proposed for allocation in the new plan, mainly Green Belt, for 9,480 homes; poorer quality employment land for 1,830; and call for sites land the council rejected, nearly all Green Belt, for 12,799. Even the proposed allocations leave 5,091 homes of the 19,924 needed between 2025 and 2042 unmet.

At the Longwood Lane inquiry in December 2025 the council gave its supply as 1.97 years, a shortfall of 4,264 homes, and the developer argued for 1.01 years. In the decision of 11 February 2026 both sides are recorded as agreeing that the council "will be unable to demonstrate a 5 year supply for the foreseeable future", and that only a new local plan would restore one.

The council's Housing Delivery Test action plan of 2024 gives the causes: adopted plans that "only identify requirements to 2026", industrial firms "more resilient than expected", so less employment land came free, and permissions for 812 homes that had lapsed.

In the August 2026 framework, a delivery score under 75% is enough on its own for policy S5 to take unmet need as shown, and a score under 85% keeps the 20% buffer in the supply sums. The supply shortfall adds evidence of unmet need to be weighed, though it is not an automatic finding. For an owner selling greenfield land in Walsall, the point is that the council counts no Green Belt land in its five years, so a field that wins permission adds homes its figures do not yet hold.

Most open land lies in the east, and the Longwood Lane appeal shows how a Green Belt field near the towns can now be judged. A housebuilder sought outline permission for up to 115 homes on land on the edge of Walsall, beside suburban housing and near the Rushall Canal. The council refused, and the appeal went to a six-day inquiry.

• The council's study was not the last word. The Black Country Green Belt study placed the 6.75 hectare field in parcel B93, more than 1,700 hectares in all, rated as making a strong contribution to checking the sprawl of large built-up areas. The inspector assessed the field itself and found it "does not make a strong contribution" to that purpose.
• That made it grey belt. On that finding the scheme "would utilise grey belt land" and met the framework's first grey belt condition in full.
• Housing need carried great weight. The inspector gave "very significant weight" to the 115 homes, 40% of them affordable, given the shortfall, and noted that the emerging plan "remains at any early stage and the need to address housing supply is immediate". The appeal was allowed.

Policy S5 of the August 2026 framework stops at the Green Belt boundary, so a Walsall field cannot use it. What it can use is grey belt, whose own need test a council normally meets by falling under five years of supply or under 75% in the delivery count; Walsall falls under both. On a larger scheme the Golden Rules follow, with their higher affordable housing share and improvements to nearby green space. How a field is tested against the Green Belt purposes is explained in our grey belt guide.

An owner selling farm land to developers near Aldridge or Pelsall therefore starts with need already established, and the work lies in showing, field by field, that the land itself does not strongly serve the Green Belt.

GOV.UK's guidance on the new plan-making system gives councils preparing a plan under the existing system "until 31 December 2026 to submit it for examination", and says the government "will consider intervening" where plan-making fails to progress. Walsall's timetable of October 2026 keeps that intention, and gives no dates for examination or adoption.

Until a new plan is adopted, applications are decided against the 2011 strategy, the 2019 allocations and national policy, with the supply shortfall in the balance. The council updates its list of sites every year, and its housing land supply page, checked on 4 November 2026, still gave the 2025 assessment as the latest.

A Delivery Result Below 75%

The Housing Delivery Test 2025 was published on 17 August 2026, and the test is refreshed annually. At 56%, Walsall is under all three of its trigger points. We make no forecast of the next result, but for as long as Walsall scores under 75%, a grey belt field has its need case made for it, whatever any new supply statement says.

So urban yards under policy S4, previously developed land and grey belt fields can be looked at now, while larger holdings that need the boundary moved belong in the examination, where the representations made between September and November 2026 will be considered. Our how it works page shows the steps from a first call to completion.