A HOUSEBUILDER is forging ahead with plans to build a £21.5m development of 80 homes in North Yorkshire.

Avant Homes Yorkshire has bought 14.47-acres of land to deliver the design-led development in Green Hammerton, just off the A59 between York and Harrogate.

The company secured planning approval from Harrogate Borough Council in March 2021, and the new site, Ambretone Park, will include three and four-bedroom homes across eight of Avant Homes’ signature designs.

About 32 of the 80 new-builds will be designated as affordable housing across a selection of one, two and three-bedroom properties.

Groundworks at Green Hammerton are due to start in July with the showhomes set to open at the end of 2021.

The first residents are expected to move into their new homes in spring 2022 with the total project taking about two-and-a-half years.

Avant Homes Yorkshire managing director, Chris Coley, said: “We are very pleased to complete this land purchase and move plans forward for our Ambretone Park development.

“Green Hammerton is ideally situated for buyers that are keen to be close to York, Harrogate and Knaresborough while also benefitting from its rural setting. We are now looking forward to commencing initial groundworks this summer.”

Based in Wakefield, Avant Homes Yorkshire is part of the Avant Homes group, one of the leading private developers of residential property in the UK. The group currently has 56 developments across its five operating regions.

Avant Homes Yorkshire currently has 10 developments under construction stretching from Green Hammerton in North Yorkshire to Waverley in the south of the region.

Green Hammerton residents also face the construction of 3,000 homes at a site south of the village which Harrogate Council chose as the preferred location for a new settlement over the former Flaxby Golf Course at the other side of the A1(M).

The decision caused a lot of upset in the village, with campaign group Keep Green Hammerton Green expressing anger over the impact on the character and setting of the conservation village.

That scheme from Leeds-based developer Loxley Homes was narrowly voted through with five voting for approval, three for refusal and three abstentions. It includes one to four bedrooms, including 32 affordable homes.