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Contractor Kier has bought the 拢23.5m landbank of Ashwood Homes, a regional housebuilder operating in Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire.

The sale also includes work in progress and related assets.

The deal is part of Kier鈥檚 wider strategy to build up its housing division with the purchase of land in areas in which it operates.

The 389 plots will be integrated into two Kier subsidiaries, Allison Homes in Lincolnshire and Twigden Homes in Cambridgeshire.

Kier paid 拢15m on completion of the deal and will pay the rest in March next year.

John Dodds, Kier chief executive said: 鈥淭his is sensible way for us to buy land for the business because it is essentially an off-market deal. There are some pretty fancy prices bid and paid in the open market.鈥�

He said the company was looking out for similar off-market deals.

He said the construction side of the business was Kier鈥檚 鈥渆ngine room鈥� but housing was significant in terms of profit.

The company is expected to secure around 1200 completions for the year ending 30 June, about 4% more than the previous year. 鈥淲e have a construction business of more than 拢1bn, with low margins,鈥� he said, 鈥渂ut we put that money into the housing business, which consumes cash but makes profit.鈥�

Dodds said despite the fact that contractors and developers such as Laing O鈥橰ourke and Heron International were attempting to enter the housing market, he was not concerned that the market would be flooded by rivals: 鈥淚 think the big volume boys are en route to more consolidation.鈥�

He said his major concern was the economy.

Alastair Stewart, analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, said that the Ashwood Homes acquisition was a "smart deal". He said it was "unlikely to impact numbers in the short-term but should be a low-cost boost to the landbank". "Although we remain concerned about the housing market, we believe that buying decent sized parcels off-market at reasonable prices reduces risk considerably."

In April, Robert Gregory, head of Kier鈥檚 housing division, resigned from the board. A replacement has yet to be appointed.