A FORMER school site is set to be turned into housing after being sold in a £2 million deal.
The land on which Mossley Hollins once stood, on Huddersfield Road, has been handed over to Great Places Housing Group.
And the deal, worth £2,050,000, is actually for more than it was valued.
The area has stood empty since Mossley Hollins moved to a new £20.4 million site across the road in 2011.
Outline planning permission for what is a brownfield site surrounded by green belt land was approved in 2017.
Now through its Cube Homes brand, Great Places is likely to construct housing after Tameside Council agreed the deal.
As well as the fee – £2,037,000 once external agents’ fees are paid – the authority will also receive £135,000 in a section 196 agreement.
The sale is part of a larger scheme to dispose of what are deemed ‘surplus assets.’
Documents relating to it state: “The council secured an independent valuation of the site dated January 19, 2022, with Sanderson & Weatherall confirming that the recommended offer of £2.050 million is representative of market value.
“In addition, the council will also receive an estimated section 106 contribution from the developer of £0.135m.
“This site was included within these surplus assets with an estimated minimum capital receipt due of £2 million.
“The net sum due of £2.037 million therefore exceeds this estimate. The site will also realise additional annual council tax revenue via the new homes constructed.
“The value of this additional revenue will be included within the council’s medium term planning assumptions once the number of properties are known subject to planning approval.”
Great Places Housing Group describes itself as ‘a housing provider with social value at its core’ and that it ‘strives to improve the lives of those living in our communities.’
On Cube Homes, it adds: “To ensure we can continue to provide this invaluable support, Cube Homes was established in 2007 as a private sector arm of Great Places to carry out profitable activity — producing funds which can then be used to subsidise our charitable activities.
“Cube Homes is profit-for-purpose, meaning any profit it makes goes straight back into helping our customers.
“In 2019/20 we delivered 229 new homes with an additional 698 affordable new homes on-site, sold 258 homes for market sale and shared ownership, and invested £52 million to build new homes.
“We invested a further £9 million, which facilitated 2,491 programmed improvements to around 1,900 of our homes and have also spent over £8 million in maintaining the condition of our customers’ homes.”
Great Places has worked in Tameside before in conjunction with Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham’s Greater Manchester Housing First (GMHF) scheme that aimed to rehouse more than 400 homeless people.
The area was one of three boroughs, alongside Oldham and Stockport, to first implement the project, which is being delivered across every local authority area.
How many Homes are to be built. ?
That land was given to the people of MOSSLEY to build a school on the proviso that houses would never be built on the site. Mossley sold out again by Shameside , they take out of the town all the time but nothing is EVER given in return
More houses to be built in Mossley…where is new or improved infrastructure to maintain all these new homes??? Doctors?? schools???, dentists??? beyond belief
I also understood that the land was given for school to be built with the proviso that it should not be built on when school no longer there. This land should remain green in order to replace the green belt taken to build the ‘new’ mossley Hollins school