Housebuilder suffers drop in revenues but pledges safety cash

Housebuilder Taylor Wimpey has suffered a 36% fall in revenues during the pandemic.

The firm has developments in Monifieth, Oudenarde, Inverkeithing and Dunfermline.

Bosses have revealed revenues hit £2.79 billion, whilst pre-tax profits fell 68% to £264 million.

But the company said it was confident the housing market will strengthen and will continue to actively buy land for future developments as orders for new homes increased.

It also announced a return of a dividend – handing out £151m to shareholders or 4.14p a share.

Chief executive Pete Redfern said: “We are confident in the mediumterm performance of the housing market and therefore accelerated our land purchases from May 2020 as high-quality land became available at attractive rates.

“We are now focusing on driving efficiencies across the business, the rollout of our new house type range and implementing our ambitious new environmental strategy.

“The UK housing market has been resilient and continues to reinforce our confidence in our outlook.”

The firm also announced that it will pay out £125m to fund the replacement of cladding and other fire safety work on all its developments built in the past 20 years.

The move, which comes three years after the Grenfell Tower fire, will cover buildings less than 18 metres tall, which are not eligible for government grants.

Taylor Wimpey has developments in Tayside and Fife.