Homebuilder Ballymore cuts dozens of jobs amid housing slump

ONE of London’s biggest homebuilders is the latest developer to cut jobs in the midst of the UK housing slump.

Ballymore Properties – the privately-owned company behind the upmarket Embassy Gardens development in Nine Elms – offered redundancies to 30 of its 802 employees over the past three months, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

All affected employees accepted the redundancy offer, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans aren’t public. A Ballymore spokesperson declined to comment.

Britain’s housing market is enduring a fall in activity triggered by higher borrowing costs and the threat of a drop in house prices. Some of the nation’s biggest homebuilders – including Persimmon and Taylor Wimpey – have predicted declining sales in 2023, with the latter also warning of job cuts this year.

Vistry Group has also told hundreds of employees they may lose their jobs as the company cuts costs, Bloomberg News reported last week. The London-listed homebuilder is weighing as many as 19 job cuts in each of its business units, with reductions expected to be in the region of 200.

Ballymore, which built more than 9,000 homes in the UK and Ireland over the past five years, warned in December that the “near term outlook for the UK appears very challenging.” The cost of a new mortgage deal has spiralled since September’s mini-budget, making homes less affordable for most customers.

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Still, there’s a glimmer of hope that Britain has already endured the worst of its housing slump. Persimmon, Taylor Wimpey, and Barratt Developments have all noted signs of improvement in weekly private sales since the start of the year. BLOOMBERG