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Wolverhampton Goodyear work will finish in three years

Work on a £150 million development on Wolverhampton's landmark Goodyear site will be completed within three years it was announced today.

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The site off the Stafford Road, Oxley, is being transformed as part of a scheme by West Midlands regeneration developer St Modwen which will see about 300 homes built.

Today, Persimmon Homes, building the development called Akron Gate, also revealed that most of the properties which have already been built have already been sold.

Stephen Cleveley, Persimmon Homes West Midlands sales director, said: "So far we have built 85 homes at Akron Gate and of those, an impressive 79 have been sold, with 74 customers already having moved in.

"A further 64 homes are under construction for completion this year.

"We expect to be on site for another two to three years in order to complete the 300 homes planned."

Two bedroom apartments there start at £99,950. Three and four bedroom town houses and detached properties are also available.

Persimmon says Government assisted schemes to help people get on the property market, including New Buy and First Buy, proved popular as they give a chance to get a mortgage with a five per cent deposit.

Delays were feared as the firm got up to 10 years extra to build homes in January 2012 due to "challenging marketing conditions".

An Aldi store opened there in July 2011 and a £2.5million Hungry-Horse pub opened in November 2012 creating 50 new jobs.

Permission for the homes was first granted in 2007.

The famous chimney stack at the site, which contained 142,662 bricks, was toppled after 81 years due to concerns over long-term maintenance costs.

Workers, many of whom bought one of the bricks to keep a part of the company's history, shed tears and shared their memories of the factory.

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