Housing Land Audit 2024

The Housing Land Audit 2024 is an assessment of the housing land supply available in the East Dunbartonshire Council area as at 31st March 2024. The audit identifies and provides a programme of expected housing delivery over an initial 7 year period and the years thereafter.

The first period includes 7 complete years commencing in April 2024 and concluding at the end of March 2031. The Housing Land Audit is based upon a snapshot date of 31st March each year with the next audit taking a base date of 31st March 2025.

All new housing development, redevelopment, conversions and subdivisions of 4 or more housing units are included. In addition to sites allocated in East Dunbartonshire  Local Development Plan 2 (LDP2) , there are a number of other sources of development that provide additional supply through windfall sites. A windfall site has been included in the audit where it has extant planning permission on 1st April 2024 and will provide 4 or more housing units or is otherwise considered to constitute residential development with a significant likelihood of delivery.

The estimate of programmed completions in this audit has been informed by East Dunbartonshire Council’s planning staff and other officers, Homes for Scotland (HfS), private housing developers and Registered Social Landlords (RSLs).

In addition to this StoryMap, the findings of the Audit can also be seen in Excel format in the 'Documents' section of the Council's  Housing Land Audit  webpage.

Preparation of this audit took place prior to the publication by the Scottish Government of the  Housing Land Audit Guidance  on 20 January 2025. It therefore reflects the approach and methodology utilised before that date.

The Housing Land Audit has multiple purposes:

• To monitor the availability of effective sites;
• To identify progress of sites through the planning process;
• To inform the Council’s school roll forecasts; and
• To provide analysis on house completions

The audit was undertaken using the following approach to engagement and representation:

The initial seven year period provides an indication of 'effective' land supply in the East Dunbartonshire Council area. The effective supply comprises all sites that are capable of being developed within the programming period.  Planning Advice Note (PAN) 2/2010  ‘Affordable Housing and Housing Land Audits’ provides the means to determine the extent to which each site is considered effective.

A programmed supply of 1368 housing units with 1303 units on allocated housing sites are identified for delivery in the seven year period starting at the base date of this audit (April 1st 2024 - 31st March 2031). An approximately 50/50 split between private market housing and affordable housing has been identified (see dashboard), with affordable completions higher during the first years of the programming period.

The years following 31st March 2031 offer the potential for a further 354 units to be delivered. It is likely that the rate of programming during these later years will be higher than described as applications are made, more information becomes available and more land is provided through the adoption of  Local Development Plan 3 (LDP3) .

Swipe left to right to view programmed completions between 2024-2031 (left) and for the years following 2031 (right).

The following map details programmed completions by tenure on a Community Area basis and sets out the predominance of each tenure type by area.

All housing sites with a total capacity of four or more dwellings collectively make up the established land supply. This comprises the remaining capacity of sites under construction; sites with planning consent; sites in adopted Local Development Plans; and where appropriate, other buildings and land with agreed potential for housing development.

It is anticipated that over 9/10 of programmed completions will take place within sites allocated or defined for residential development in LDP2, the remainder taking place within windfall or non-allocated sites. This ratio reflects the plan-led approach to development in East Dunbartonshire.

It is anticipated that over 60% of programmed completions will take place on brownfield or previously developed land, or will constitute the conversion and redevelopment of existing buildings.

Of the sites presented in the first seven years of the audit, around 1/2 remained available for development as at the base date on 31 March 2024. Consent had been granted within 1/10 of sites and 1/3 of sites were under construction.

 Homes for Scotland  verified the findings of the HLA on 14 November 2024. Programming for five sites is disputed, comprising 206 units in total; 96 affordable units and 110 private market units. Disputed programming is as follows:

Small sites of 1 to 3 units account for a very limited proportion of the total number of new houses built in East Dunbartonshire (approx. 1%). In order for the HLA to be proportionate, full details are currently only provided for sites of 4 housing units or more. Small sites are difficult to programme as the number of developments being delayed or not taken forward tends to be greater than that for larger sites. However, the HLA will record the number of applications for small sites gaining planning consent and in the event that a sustained increase becomes apparent, or if guidance regarding the preparation of audits changes, the methodology in future housing land audits may need to be revisited.

The table below lists the planning applications for sites of 1 to 3 units that were approved in the period 1st April 2023 to 31st March 2024. Note that this list has been filtered to exclude applications which renew an existing consent, amendments to existing consents and where there is no net increase in the number of dwellings (i.e. where a new house replaces an existing/previous dwelling).

Programming during the 2024 > 2031 time period can be seen below compared to actual completions as set out within  Scottish Government house completions data . The programming as set out is considered reasonable given subdued market expectations as at the base date on 31 March 2024, and accords with the trend for completions in the private market sector.

Further details on the Councils HLA process are available on request at  development.plan@eastdunbarton.gov.uk