Selling Land in Mid Sussex

• Land on the edge of Burgess Hill, Haywards Heath or East Grinstead that is not already allocated.
• Fields beside the larger villages, from Hassocks and Hurstpierpoint to Copthorne and Crawley Down.
• Previously developed land, old nurseries and yards anywhere in the district.
• Plots inside the towns and villages, where policy S4 favours new homes.
• Land in the High Weald where a smaller, well contained scheme could avoid being major development.
• Larger holdings that could suit the next plan, which will have to go further again.

Much of the land that could come forward here is farmed or grazed, and an option leaves that use in place: we agree a price at the start, above what the land is worth today, pay for all the planning, and complete the purchase once permission is secured. If it never is, the land stays yours and you owe nothing. Our page on farmland explains how this works alongside a farm business, and the West Sussex overview sets the district beside its neighbours.

• 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 District Plan 2021 to 2039 was submitted for examination on 8 July 2024. In December 2025 the Planning Inspectorate appointed a new inspector, Jonathan Bore, whose hearings opened on 24 February 2026 and ran for three weeks.

The post-hearing letter found the plan's spatial strategy sound but its housing number too low. The submitted plan had used local need of 1,090 homes a year; updated inputs to the same method gave 999. On top of that, the inspector asked for a substantial allowance for neighbours' unmet need, principally Crawley's but with regard to the south coast too, and set a target range of 1,200 to 1,300 homes a year.

How the New Requirement Is Built

Across nineteen years the total works out at about 1,267 homes a year, in the middle of the inspector's range and well above the 876 a year the 2018 plan asked for until 2023/24. It is stepped, rising to 1,446 a year for the last eight years, so the heaviest years fall in the 2030s.

For an owner selling land around Burgess Hill, Haywards Heath or the larger villages, that higher target matters because it is what brought new sites into the plan so late in the examination.

The adopted plan's strategic policies passed five years old in March 2023, so until the new plan is adopted supply is tested against the government's standard method. For the Ansty appeal the council signed a statement of common ground on land supply in June 2026. Measured at 1 April 2026 against 1,343 homes a year under the December 2024 method, plus a 5% buffer, it needs 7,051 homes over five years and counts 5,293 deliverable. That is 3.75 years, a shortfall of 1,758 homes, and both sides agree the council cannot show five years.

The council calls this a short-term problem that adoption will put right, and the appellants disagree. Its land supply note for the examination, published in July 2026 with the same base date, measures supply against the modified plan instead and assumes adoption in 2026/27:

The same note records completions of 1,247 in 2023/24, then 837 and 889 in the two years since, so the step to 1,312 a year asks for more than the district has built in any year of this plan period.

The two results differ because the appeal figure asks for 1,343 homes every year while the plan asks for 999 in its first two years, and because the note counts expected building on sites the modified plan would allocate. One describes applications decided now, the other the position once the plan is in force.

What This Means for a Field Outside the Plan

Policy S5 of the August 2026 framework supports homes on land well related to a settlement, where roads, schools and drainage can take them, if unmet need is evidenced. A supply short of five years is evidence of that need to be weighed, not an automatic finding. It lasts only until adoption, so for a field that sits properly against a town or larger village the months before then are when an application carries most weight; after it, the plan and its next review become the main route.

The consultation on the main modifications ran from 27 July to 7 September 2026, and the council has sent the responses to the inspector. The examination page shows hearings resuming at 10am on 3 November 2026. The council's plan review page still points to adoption at the end of 2026. That would need the inspector's report to follow soon after the hearings.

A Stepped Requirement and 5.69 Years on Adoption

Once adopted, the plan's stepped requirement becomes the measure of supply for five years, and the council expects to show 5.69 years against it, which would end the shortfall agreed at Ansty. From 1 July 2026, planning decisions add a 20% buffer when a requirement adopted within the past five years, tested at examination under a pre-December 2024 framework, sits at 80% or less of the standard method. This plan is examined under the September 2023 framework, but its average of about 1,267 a year is around 94% of 1,343, so the note's 5% buffer would stand.

Delivery is the next measure. A new edition of the delivery test follows the Housing Delivery Test 2025 each year, and the lower completions since 2024 will count in it. Below 95% an action plan is needed, below 85% a 20% buffer applies, and below 75% unmet need is treated as evidenced under policy S5.

Reorganisation is paused. Proposals to replace the West Sussex councils with new unitary authorities were paused on 7 September 2026, and May 2027 elections will use existing boundaries. For now the district council remains the body finishing its own plan.

Modified Allocations Before the Inspector, Other Land Before Adoption

• Land in the modifications goes before the inspector in November, and the detailed work behind an application can start now.
• Land left out is worth looking at before adoption if it sits well against a town or larger village; otherwise it is best prepared for the next review.
• Previously developed land and sites within the settlements do not depend on either, and can be looked at today.