Ben Felton has been given responsibility for expanding Avant Homes’ operations across the East Midlands by working with the company’s land, construction, technical and sales teams.
“Avant Homes is an ambitious company and one which I am very pleased to have joined,” he said.
Avant Homes East Midlands regional chairman Mark Cook said: “Ben is an experienced managing director with excellent leadership skills. He is a superb addition to Avant Homes and will be intrinsic in further shaping our business and driving it forward in the East Midlands.
He is Avant’s second senior recruit from Persimmon recently, following Richard Hosie’s appointment as managing director for Avant’s West Yorkshire regional operations.
Avant Homes is controlled by former Persimmon chief executive Jeff Fairburn who garnered much publicity about his £75m bonus in 2018. Despite his business success, he was forced out of Persimmon by the end of the year because of the bad publicity that he was unable to control. After a year out of the spotlight, he bought a small Wetherby builder, Berkeley DeVeer. He used this in 2021 as his vehicle to take over Avant Homes, with private equity backing, and has been clear about his growth ambitions for the company.
In the year before Fairburn’s takeover, Avant Homes built fewer than 2,000 homes. Under his ownership, the medium-term goal is to sell more than 6,000 new homes per year.
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