Local plans are being rewritten. Here is when to act.

Most of the value in development land is created at one moment: when a site is allocated in a local plan. Before that, it is farmland with hope attached. After it, it is a housing site with a price. Where your land sits in that process matters more than almost anything else you can control — and the process has just changed.

What has changed

• A new system is live. New plan-making regulations came into force on 25 March 2026, replacing the 2012 rules. Councils can still submit plans under the old system until 31 December 2026; after that, everything runs through the new one.
• A 30-month clock. Once a council formally starts, it has a target of 30 months to adopt its plan, after a preparatory “getting ready” stage of at least four months.
• Three gateways. A self-assessment that starts the clock; early advice from the Planning Inspectorate once draft content has been consulted on; and a final check that the plan is ready for examination.
• A public timetable. Every council must publish a plan timetable with at least ten milestones and keep it up to date. For the first time, a landowner can see exactly when each stage is due.
• No more duty to cooperate. The requirement for neighbouring councils to cooperate on cross-boundary issues is being removed.

Why that matters for your land

A faster, more structured process is good news for anyone with a site ready to go. It is bad news for anyone who plans to wait and see. Under the old system, plans drifted for years and a late site could often find a way in. Under the new one, the stages at which sites are considered come early and close on schedule. A site that turns up after the draft plan has taken shape faces a much harder task.

The stages, and what to do at each

1. Getting ready — before the clock starts. The council scopes the plan and runs early engagement. This is where most councils will look for sites, and it is where your land needs to be put forward, with evidence that it can actually be delivered.
2. Draft plan — after Gateway 1. The strategy and the site selection take shape. If your land is in, the job is to keep it in. If it is out, this is the last realistic point to argue it back.
3. Examination — after Gateway 3. Sites that were left out are rarely added at this stage. Objections here are about defending or challenging the plan, not introducing new land.
4. Adoption. Allocated sites become the obvious targets for housebuilders and promoters, and their value crystallises. Everything else waits for the next plan.

What a council actually wants to see

Councils are not choosing the most attractive fields; they are choosing the sites most likely to deliver homes within the plan period. That means a clean title, a workable access, no showstopping constraint on flooding, highways or ecology, and ideally a promoter or developer already engaged. A site with those answers ready is a very different submission from a red line on a map.

Meanwhile: the housing land supply window

A plan is not the only route. The December 2024 changes to national policy made the government’s housing need calculation mandatory, raising need by around a fifth across England, and reinstated the requirement for every council to show a five-year supply of housing land. Where a council cannot, the presumption in favour of sustainable development applies, and well-located sites can come forward by planning application ahead of any plan. For Green Belt land, the new “grey belt” category has opened sites that would previously have been dismissed outright.

Whether that window is open where your land is depends on your council’s supply position, and that changes year to year.

What to do now

1. Find your council’s plan timetable. It must be published and kept current, so it will tell you which stage it is at.
2. Check its housing land supply position. It changes the options available to you now.
3. Get the basics in order before the site submission stage: title, access, and a first look at constraints.
4. Decide how you will promote the land — yourself, through a promoter, or with a developer — before the window opens, not after.

General information, not advice. Every site is different, and a proper answer needs a look at yours.