Leading land agent Aston Mead has welcomed two government initiatives launched this week, which will create tens of thousands of new homes across the country.

The company was responding to plans for 14 new villages and 3 ‘garden’ towns in England announced on Monday, as well as details for thousands of new discounted starter homes on 30 local authority brownfield sites, the details for which were released on Tuesday.

Aston Mead Land & Planning Director Adam Hesse said: “This is precisely the sort of initiative we have been demanding from the Government for some years now. We desperately need radical and large-scale proposals like this to deal with the shortage of available property in the country. And as these are the first two Government announcements of 2017, it’s clear that Theresa May and her team are rightly making housing a key priority in the year ahead.”

The plans will deliver 14 new villages of between 1,500 to 10,000 homes to be built outside existing settlements, as well as three towns of more than 10,000 houses each, alongside Aylesbury, Taunton and Harlow and Gilston.

In addition, thousands of new starter homes will be built this year, and made available exclusively to first-time buyers aged between 23 and 40 at a discount of at least 20% to market value, with a cap of £450,000 in London, and £250,000 outside.

Adam Hesse added: “The creation of 200,000 new properties in these garden towns and villages from Cheshire down to Devon will not only provide a high quantity of homes, but also bring the jobs and facilities the local communities so desperately need.

“Meanwhile, when it comes to starter homes, dynamic and pro-active local authorities are clearly at an advantage. The first 30 have been chosen on the basis of their potential to build the homes quickly, with the partnerships being established under the Government’s £1.2bn Starter Home Land Fund.

“So these announcements undoubtedly make for an excellent start to the New Year; but the government shouldn’t just sit on its laurels. It’s important to keep the momentum going and deliver this many homesevery year from now on. We desperately need more initiatives like this – building on both brownfield sites as well as the less attractive areas of green belt – in order to help alleviate the UK housing crisis.”​