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Housebuilder Persimmon has announced a 65% rise in underlying pre-tax profit for the six months to June 30 this year.

The firm said the rise, to 拢98.7m, was on revenue up 13% to 拢806.7m from the sales of 4,712 homes, 6% more than in the same period last year.

Persimmon chair Nicholas Wrigley said the results were 鈥渁n excellent start鈥� to the firm鈥檚 plan to return 拢1.9bn in cash to shareholders over the next nine years.

The firm generated 拢112.9m in cash over the period, more than double the amount in the first half of 2011.

The underlying profit figure doesn鈥檛 include a 拢1.7m write-back in the value of Persimmon鈥檚 land bank, which is much smaller than the 拢12m write-back in the same period last year.

It also added 5,779 homes to the firm鈥檚 land bank, representing over six year鈥檚 supply at current rates of build. The operating profit margin was 12.2%.

The firm said sales rates were 18% up on the previous year over the period. However, since the end of June sales have slowed, and are now running just 5% above the prior year, with cancellation rates at 鈥渉istorically low鈥� levels of around 18%. The firm said it will maintain the number of open sites at the current level of around 380.

The firm said it had now sold 220 homes through the government鈥檚 NewBuy scheme, and said it was 鈥減leased to see recent rate reductions by the lenders which should help affordability.鈥�

Wrigley added: 鈥淲e expect conditions in the UK housing market to remain challenging reflecting the wider issues within the economy. However, we anticipate continued firm underlying demand for new homes but this will remain constrained by the low level of mortgage availability.鈥�