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Berkeley Homes
In 1991 Berkeley acquired the Manchester-based house builder Crosby Homes, which was later sold in 2003. During the 1990’s Berkeley changed its operation to focus on major urban regeneration sites in London, Birmingham, Manchester and other large cities. By 2000, Berkeley’s preference was to concentrate on fewer schemes, predominantly large-scale redevelopment in the London area, building executive homes, mixed-use developments, riverside apartments and homes in historic refurbished buildings.
Today, the Berkeley Group is primarily in the business of urban regeneration, with a target to build over 95% of its development on brownfield land. The Berkeley Group trades under a range of brand names: Berkeley, St James, St Edward, St George, Berkeley First, and Berkeley Commercial.
The St George brand specialises in high quality mixed use regeneration, on brownfield land in London. Often combining new homes, apartments and penthouses with retail, leisure and other amenities for the residents. St George has grown to become London's largest, mixed-use developer and has created homes in some of the most high profile locations in London.
St James was originally a joint venture with Thames Water in 1996 and develops projects that "embrace private residential development and commercial property with recreational and community facilities".
St Edward was established as a joint venture with Prudential building "unique residentially led developments."
Berkeley First specialises in modern architectural contemporary homes with “stylish specifications and intelligent space planning.” including student and keyworker accommodation.
Berkeley base their operational success on a founding principal of maintaining a “disciplined procedure to enable both the construction and marketing of sites to start as early as possible in the development cycle, thus maximising return on capital and minimising marketing risk.”
Key Directors:
Tony Pidgley Group Chairman
Rob Perrins Group Managing Director
Financials: (year end 30 April 2012)
Turnover £1,041 million
Operating profit £ 226 million (18.8%)
Market capital £1,930 million (as of 8 August 2012)
Average selling price £280,000
Land bank 26,021 plots
Number of new homes built to financial year ended 30 April 2012 - 3,565 new homes
(2011 - 2,544 new homes : 2010 - 2,201 new homes)
Awards
Number of NHBC awards per year (averaged over last six years)
7 Quality awards 3 Seal of Excellence awards
Homes per quality award ratio for 2012 - 324 homes built per award.
(2011 - 254 homes built per award : 2010 - 314)
The lower the number the better the quality.
What their customers say:
Review links below to see what some customers
think of their new home:
Berkeley Homes (Oxford & Chiltern) Limited
Berkeley House
Abingdon Science Park, Barton Lane
Abingdon
Oxfordshire OX14 3NB
Tel: 01235 559 111
St George Plc,
St George House
76 Crown Road,
Twickenham
TW1 3EU
Tel: 020 8917 4040
St Edward
Tel: 020 8952 2853
St James
Tel: 01372 364 500
Berkeley Homes (Urban Renaissance) Limited
380 Queenstown Road
London
SW8 4PE
Tel: 020 7720 2600
Berkeley Homes (Capital) plc
Berkeley House
7 Oakhill Road
Sevenoaks
Kent TN13 1NQ
Tel: 01732 227 500
Berkeley Homes (Southern) Limited
Berkeley House
Summers Place
Stane Street
Billingshurst
West Sussex RH14 9GN
Tel: 01403 279 000
Information on national house builders
Berkeley Group Head Office
Berkeley Group Holdings plc, Berkeley House,19 Portsmouth Road,
Cobham, Surrey. KT11 1JG Tel: 01932 868655 Fax: 01932 868667
Berkeley Homes Regional Offices
History
After five years at Crest Homes, Tony Pidgley and Jim Farrer left to set up Berkeley Homes in 1976, originally based in Weybridge, Surrey. They began by focusing on high-end executive housing on single plots and smaller executive developments. In the first year the company built four new homes, all being sold “off-plan” providing a turnover of £121,000 and a profit of £21,000 (17.4%). Berkeley quickly expanded across the Home Counties and into the West, the South Midlands and East Anglia. By 1988, Berkeley Homes were building over 600 executive new homes a year. In December 1985 Berkeley gained a full listing on the London Stock Exchange and in less than ten years, Berkeley had grown from a company capitalised at £50,000 to a PLC valued at over £67m.
In 1988, Berkeley famously began to sell off its landbank, convinced that the housing boom was unsustainable, in order to protect the balance sheet rather than to maximise short-term profits. When the downturn materialised, it vindicated Berkeley's strategy and the company re-entered a much cheaper land market in 1990-91.