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Inside Property Development

Inside Property Development

Written by: Paul Higgs
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 Inside Property Development is a no-nonsense show that rolls up its sleeves and digs into how the world of land, planning and property development really works in practice, providing rare access industry insiders and valuable insights into real-world development deals, as well as keeping you up to date with the latest industry news. Colourful and at times controversial, the show focuses on how to do development the right way and aims to inspire and empower developers of all levels, as well as other professionals in the both the private and public sectors, to work together to build more and better homes that we can all be proud of. Connect with us on our socials for more educational content to help you achieve success in development. Millbank Land Academy Website: www.millbanklandacademy.co.uk Millbank Group Website: www.millbankgroup.co.uk Connect on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/paul-higgs Connect on Facebook: www.facebook.com/paul.higgs.50 Join our community on Facebook: www.facebook.com/MillbankLandAcademy See all episodes on YouTube: www.youtube.com/@millbanklandacademy1266 Economics Education Leadership Management & Leadership Personal Finance
Episodes
  • Are Small, High Quality Schemes the Smartest Play for Developers Now? – with Steve Morris

    Are Small, High Quality Schemes the Smartest Play for Developers Now? – with Steve Morris
    Jan 21 2026
    In this episode Paul is joined by Steve Morris the co-founder and Managing Director of Linfield Construction, to discuss the viability of building a property development business later in life – especially if you come from a contracting and commercial background rather than following the more typical pure developer route. The conversation covers listed buildings, conversions, contracting margins and planning risk and why so many opportunities don’t stack up once you price the build and contingency properly- As well as how main contractors actually make (or lose) their money, why pre‑applications and consultants don´t mitigate planning risk for you, and why smaller, high‑quality schemes can be a better approach. KEY TAKEAWAYS Not every opportunity is worth chasing – saying no to most deals is essential; if something only works on heroic assumptions about planning, build, or sales, walking away is a win, not a loss. Your past experience is an edge. But years in contracting, buying, or surveying won´t protect you if you are not disciplined enough to fully assess risk, choose the right partners and structure deals well. Look at planning as a business risk, not just a technical process. Pre‑apps, officers, and consultants do not all work in the same way, they are inconsistent. You need your own planning strategy. Set clear limits on how much time and money you can spend on chasing planning and a willingness to abandon sites that drag you into a hole. Remember one big job, or one big client, can wipe you out if it goes wrong. A portfolio of smaller schemes and diverse workstreams can be a way to spread the risk. But this approach is still not risk free. Later in life, you can design a business that actually suits you- Pursuing smaller, high‑quality projects that you are proud of and don´t require you to spend countless nights away from work is relentlessly scaling, just for the sake of it. Planning policy has never been more pro‑development and competition from SME developers has never been lower, so if you’re disciplined about risk and viability, now is a surprisingly good time to pursue schemes. BEST MOMENTS “I would much rather be doing new build than conversions.” “If you can’t ascertain the risk, then of course you need to stick, you know, a much bigger margin and a much bigger contingency on it.” “Often, pre apps are not worth the paper they’re written on. They’ve basically got no legal or policy weight… people basically give way too much credence to pre apps.” ABOUT THE GUEST https://linfieldconstruction.co.uk ABOUT THE HOST Paul Higgs is a Chartered Planning and Development Surveyor with 40+ years' experience in land, planning and development and a 100% success track record in winning planning consents. Paul undertook his first refurb project when he was just 17 and then worked his way up from labouring on building sites to becoming Head of Land for renowned plc housebuilder, Barratt Developments. He managed to escape the corporate world in 2002 to set up what is now a multimillion-pound award-winning property development company, Millbank Group. In 2013 Paul founded the Millbank Land Academy, the UK’s first training company dedicated to property development; to teach established and aspiring developers the insider secrets the big housebuilders don’t want you to know! Paul is also a founding investor and former board director of the industry-leading PropTech Co, LandTech, and has lectured on Advanced Development Valuations on the MSc Property Development at London South Bank University. CONTACT METHOD LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-higgs Millbank Land Academy: https://www.millbanklandacademy.co.uk Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/paulhiggsofficial YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@InsidePropertyDevelopment This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/
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    57 mins
  • From Politics to Property Development

    From Politics to Property Development
    Jan 14 2026
    Today, Paul sits down with former Wandsworth councillor and Pocket Living land director and the Managing Director and founder of Urban Sketch Nick Cuff. Drawing on his rare mix of political and development experience, Nick explains what a genuinely pro‑development culture looks like, and why most UK councils are not pro-development. They discuss the realities of making small urban sites work, the unintended damage caused by rigid space standards, and why current affordable housing expectations and late‑stage reviews are driving capital out of UK development. If you’re a developer, architect or planning professional trying to get dense urban schemes to stack up in today’s market, this frank, practical conversation will give you plenty to think about. KEY TAKEAWAYS Pro‑development councils are built, not found - leadership, culture and officer relationships matter as much as policy wording if you want schemes to move. Small urban sites can deliver serious value, even 100% “affordable” products, when density, smart design and tenure innovation are combined well. Rigid space standards and one‑size‑fits‑all unit mixes are killing viability and ignoring how real households live, especially sharers and young professionals. Co‑living and compact rental models remain one of the few viable ways to do dense urban housing, but only in highly amenitiesed, well‑connected locations. Paul and Nick discuss how and why the Pocket Development model worked. Nick explains how Urban Sketch is leveraging the shared living trend to create more homes. Developers and architects must get better at explaining viability and risk in simple terms. Without a clear story and end game, policy will keep loading costs ontoprojects and hardly anything will get built. BEST MOMENTS “If you've got good people, both members and officers, working together, planning's such a huge catalyst for economic growth, for renewal, for improvement to the micro and the macro, street and town environment.” “We've loaded the current planning system with so many Snakes and Ladders that we've lost our ability to navigate it.” “You can't get private money, someone else's money, to commit suicide on behalf of the state's lauded objectives (e.g. affordable housing).” “We are witnessing the great decapitalization of the London and Southeast market. What capital is in the market is seeking, through impairment or exit, to get out, and very limited capital, fresh capital is willing to come back in.” ABOUT THE GUEST https://www.linkedin.com/in/nick-cuff-4757b220 http://propviews.co.uk ABOUT THE HOST Paul Higgs is a Chartered Planning and Development Surveyor with 40+ years experience in land, planning and development and a 100% success track record in winning planning consents. Paul undertook his first refurb project when he was just 17 and then worked his way up from labouring on building sites to becoming Head of Land for renowned plc housebuilder, Barratt Developments. He managed to escape the corporate world in 2002 to set up what is now a multimillion-pound award-winning property development company, Millbank Group. In 2013 Paul founded the Millbank Land Academy, the UK’s first training company dedicated to property development; to teach established and aspiring developers the insider secrets the big housebuilders don’t want you to know! Paul is also a founding investor and former board director of the industry-leading PropTech Co, LandTech, and has lectured on Advanced Development Valuations on the MSc Property Development at London South Bank University. CONTACT METHOD LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-higgs Millbank Land Academy: https://www.millbanklandacademy.co.uk Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/paulhiggsofficial YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@InsidePropertyDevelopment This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/
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    1 hr
  • Architect/Developer Relationships with Cameron Straughan

    Architect/Developer Relationships with Cameron Straughan
    Jan 7 2026
    How can architects and developers work together to deliver projects that are financially viable, genuinely regenerative – create schemes like this that actually get built as planned? In this episode, Paul is interviewed by Cameron Straughan, a master’s student in architecture at the University of Bath, who is currently researching the realities of architect–developer relationships. Together they explore how these dynamics influence the design and delivery of housing in the UK. They cover the gaps in architects training, how land values and viability, not greedy margins, really drive what gets off the drawing board and the role planning policy, sustainability standards and build costs are currently playing in the market. KEY TAKEAWAYS Many architects qualify without spending time on a building site. That lack of hands‑on experience can lead to designs that don´t go through planning, are not financially viable or are too difficult to build. Developers need to do the land and planning analysis, so they can give a clear, detailed brief to their architect rather than saying “do me a scheme” and hoping the architect solves everything. Architects are taught a lot about sustainability and regenerative design, but very little about land economics, viability, and planning strategy – which is why many of their ideas never make it off the drawing board. The misconception that developers are greedy and making huge profits is leading to the creation of ridiculous rules that add prohibitive costs, making many schemes undeliverable. BEST MOMENTS “It's the developer’s job to understand it all and manage it all, not the architects ... don´t assume that they would always know the best thing to do.” “Build costs and different ways and techniques of building things all feeds into the equation when I give an architect an instruction.” “Architects don’t get taught about the development process.” “We can save a whole load of time not arguing and pushing for things that just don't work, if we could all get on the same page a bit more.” CAMERON STRAUGHAN LINK https://www.linkedin.com/in/cameron-straughan-43545827b/?originalSubdomain=uk ABOUT THE HOST Paul Higgs is a Chartered Planning and Development Surveyor with 40+ years; experience in land, planning and development and a 100% success track record in winning planning consents. Paul undertook his first refurb project when he was just 17 and then worked his way up from labouring on building sites to becoming Head of Land for renowned plc housebuilder, Barratt Developments. He managed to escape the corporate world in 2002 to set up what is now a multimillion-pound award-winning property development company, Millbank Group. In 2013 Paul founded the Millbank Land Academy, the UK’s first training company dedicated to property development; to teach established and aspiring developers the insider secrets the big housebuilders don’t want you to know! Paul is also a founding investor and former board director of the industry-leading PropTech Co, LandTech, and has lectured on Advanced Development Valuations on the MSc Property Development at London South Bank University. CONTACT METHOD LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-higgs Millbank Land Academy: https://www.millbanklandacademy.co.uk Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/paulhiggsofficial YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@InsidePropertyDevelopment This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/
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    57 mins
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