Preliminary results for the twelve months to 31 December 2021, ahead of audited accounts to be finalised in March, show an expected turnover of £1.25 billion for the first time and pre-tax profit over £130 million, an increase of 35% on 2019.

Total home completions reached 2,904 – an increase of 19% on the 2019 total of 2,449 units (59% on the 2020 total of 1,835 units), while sales per site per week for 2021 were 0.76, compared to 0.53 in 2019 and 0.51 achieved in 2020.

CALA said it expects to be one of the only major homebuilders to rebound strongly enough to increase housing delivery compared to the last uninterrupted year of trading.

Kevin Whitaker, CEO at CALA Group, said: “2021 has been a very successful year for the business, during which we have strongly rebounded to significantly exceed pre-pandemic 2019 volumes, revenue and pre-tax profit. Several factors have enabled our excellent financial performance across the 12-month period. In particular, we have seen many people making positive new home choices to seek out larger living spaces and this has driven very strong demand for our homes in aspirational suburban locations.

“While there have been significant supply chain challenges across the industry, the market has been strong. This, combined with improvements to our operational efficiency and the hard work of our team, has enabled us to deliver an excellent performance across the year. We expect to be one of the only major homebuilders to deliver new home completions in excess of pre-pandemic levels, with 2021 sales 19% up on 2019.

“Looking ahead to 2022 we are positive about our prospects. We enter the year with record forward private reservations, equating to a GDV of £488m. This year we plan to increase our housing delivery further still – building more than 3,200 homes across our eight regional operations. We have a strong short-term land bank to underpin the delivery of our current business plan and continue to invest heavily in land as we look towards our medium-term ambition of reaching a revenue of £1.8bn by 2026.”