Persimmon plc

Persimmon plc is a British housebuilding company, headquartered in York, England. The company is named after a horse which won the 1896 Derby and St. Leger for the Prince of Wales (the future Edward VII). It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.

History

Persimmon was founded by Duncan Davidson in 1972. After leaving George Wimpey, Davidson had formed Ryedale Homes in 1965, selling it to Comben Homes in 1972 for £600,000. Davidson restarted development again in the Yorkshire area; Persimmon began to expand regionally with the formation of an Anglian division in 1976 followed by operations in the Midlands and the south-west.Wellings, Fred: Dictionary of British Housebuilders (2006) Troubador. In 1984, Persimmon bought Tony Fawcett’s Sketchmead company; Fawcett had been a director of Ryedale and he became deputy managing director at Persimmon. The enlarged company was floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1985, by which time the Company was building around 1,000 houses a year.

Steady regional expansion took volumes up to 2,000 by 1988 with a target of 4,000 following the housing recession. Tony Fawcett had died in 1990 and in 1993 John White was appointed as chief executive with Davidson remaining as an executive chairman. In 1995, Persimmon made the first of a series of major acquisitions. Ideal Homes, once the largest housebuilder in the country and then part of Trafalgar House was bought for £176m giving the Group a much stronger presence in the south-east. This was followed by the purchase of the Scottish housing business of John Laing plc and Tilbury Douglas Homes.

In 2001, Persimmon acquired Beazer Homes UK, for £612m, taking output to over 12,000 a year. The deal came about after Beazer and Bryant announced a 'merger of equals' to create a new house builder called Domus. However, Taylor Woodrow stepped in with a £556 million bid for Bryant, and Persimmon bought Beazer, a company named after its founder Brian Beazer, and originally started in Bath. The acquisition of Beazer brought with it Charles Church, an upmarket housing business founded by Charles and Susanna Church in 1965.

In January 2006, Persimmon acquired Westbury, another listed UK house builder, for a total consideration of £643 million.

Operations

It builds homes under the Persimmon Homes, Charles Church and Westbury Partnerships brands.

Criticism

Poor build quality

Persimmon has regularly been criticised for the poor build quality of some of its homes. Examples include wiring up sockets dangerously giving the potential to shock, installing wobbly bannisters, laying turf on builder's rubble rather than on newly laid soil and radiators being not properly fixed to the wall.

In 2008, a boy was killed by a falling mantelpiece. Persimmon, which sub-contracted company KD Childs to fit the fireplaces, had not checked the standards and had never received documents about how fireplaces were fitted. A mantelpiece had previously fallen at another Persimmon Home but was treated as a "one-off" incident.

In 2018, a couple created signs warning potential neighbours against buying homes in their Newquay estate, citing multiple faults which Persimmon had, as of 19 July 2018, failed to correct, including patio doors which did not close properly, protruding nails, and damp and mould resulting from poor plumbing.

Persimmon's poor new build quality was the subject of a Channel 4 '' Dispatches'' documentary broadcast on 15 July 2019. In August 2019, Persimmon appointed an independent team of construction quality inspectors to ensure its homes are built to required standards.

In April 2019, Persimmon launched an independent review of customer care and quality of work following criticism. Persimmon had been ranked the lowest major housebuilder in the Home Builders Federation

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