Leading Scottish housebuilder Westpoint Homes has announced plans to deliver 750 new homes over the next five years across the country, supported by long-standing lending partner, Close Brothers Property Finance, part of the Close Brothers Group.
Headquartered in Renfrewshire, Westpoint Homes has over 250 homes currently under construction across 4 sites in Scotland, alongside an existing pipeline which will bring forward a total of 750 over the next five years.
Close Brothers Property Finance, one of the largest specialist development finance providers in the UK, has committed to supporting the pipeline, giving the housebuilder much-needed financial certainty in an uncertain market. Over the last 14 years, Close Brothers Property Finance has supported Westpoint Homes in the delivery of over 900 new homes with a combined Gross Development Value of £377 million.
Ian Rigby, Managing Director at Westpoint Homes says:
“Close Brothers Property Finance’s willingness to take the time to properly understand our business needs and provide bespoke facilities has been central to our ability to deliver the high-quality, crafted homes we have been building across the country for 40 years.
“Knowing we have the team at Close Brothers supporting us gives us the confidence to invest in our business and bid for sites. Their support has allowed us to unlock equity from completed projects and recycle that capital into the next one which means we can keep scaling our business, hiring more people and taking on increasingly ambitious development projects, including our landmark Finnieston site.”
The latest Westpoint Homes development, The 945 recently launched. Located in the sought-after neighbourhood of Finnieston, Glasgow, the project comprises 62 apartments and 6 commercial spaces. The 945 represents one of the largest single facilities provided by Close Brothers to Westpoint Homes to date, at £18.75m and is testament to the evolution of facility size and complexity that the lender is now offering borrowers.
Close Brothers Property Finance has been active in the Scottish market since 2009 and has supported the development of 1,786 new homes in the last decade. The commitment comes as Scottish new-build completions fell to 17,268 in the year to March 2026, down 10 per cent year on year, with the country now in the third year of a declared national housing emergency.
Gary Ferris, Business Development Director at Close Brothers Property Finance says:
“Scotland is building fewer homes than at almost any point in the past decade. SME housebuilders have the sites, the skills and the appetite, but too often they are constrained by the shape of the funding available to them. Westpoint’s 750-home pipeline shows what becomes possible when a developer has certainty over five years rather than one scheme at a time.”
Traditionally Close Brothers Property Finance has offered facilities in the range of £1 million to £5 million and remains committed to that core SME housebuilder market. In tandem to that lending stream, the bank is now extending its maximum facility size up to £70 million, considering larger, more complex structured finance deals for established customers.
These facilities include revolving credit facilities, large-scale Purpose Built Student Accommodation (PBSA) and Build to Rent (BTR), and are a response to the evolving demand for specialist, flexible funding solutions to meet the needs of customers in Scotland. The expansion follows sustained investment in the Edinburgh team, most recently the appointment of Stuart Scott, as Director, Real Estate Finance, who joined the team from Investec this month.
Gary Ferris, concludes:
“Our commitment to housebuilders and developers in Scotland is unchanged. What is changing is the range of what we can fund alongside it. Larger facilities, revolving structures and the ability to back PBSA and BTR mean we can keep supporting customers as their ambitions grow, rather than reaching a ceiling.”