Local authorities hold over £9 billion in unspent developer contributions across England and Wales, £6.6 billion of that from Section 106 agreements specifically. If your Section 106 agreement is more than five years old, your right to recover may already have arisen. We carry out the full review at no cost. Nothing is owed unless we recover something.
Figures: Home Builders Federation, March 2026.
We handle the entire recovery process on your behalf, from reviewing your agreement through to receiving and accounting for the funds.
Complete our short enquiry form with the basics about your Section 106 obligation. We review the agreement and confirm whether a recovery entitlement exists, at no cost or obligation to you.
Free initial reviewWe write to your local planning authority and request a full account of how your contribution was spent. Once we have confirmed there is an unspent balance, we make a formal request for repayment and manage it through to payment.
We handle everythingWe deduct our success fee from the recovered sum and transfer the net balance to you within 5 working days of receipt. If nothing is recovered, you owe us nothing at all.
Success-only basis. Nothing owed if nothing is recovered.Many developers assume that the absence of an express repayment clause ends the matter. It does not always. In Hampshire County Council v Beazer Homes Ltd [2010] EWHC 3095 (QB), the High Court held that a repayment term can be implied into a Section 106 agreement, but only in limited circumstances where the parties plainly intended it to form part of the contract. Recovery under an express clause remains the materially stronger position. We will assess your specific position and advise you at no cost before proceeding.
We charge nothing unless and until a sum is recovered on your behalf. Our fee is deducted from the recovered amount. You receive the balance, having risked nothing.
The rate and all terms are set out in our engagement letter, which you will receive before any work begins.
You hand the matter to us once. We carry it through and report back at each stage.
We work out what your Section 106 agreement required the council to do with your contribution, and by when. Every review is specific to your agreement and your site.
We establish how much of the contribution was spent, what it was spent on, and how much remains. If the council's account is incomplete, we follow up until the position is clear.
Where a balance is repayable, we write formally to the council setting out the sum due, with interest where the agreement provides for it, and ask for repayment within a set period.
Where the agreement requires repayment, the council is obliged to return the unspent balance. When payment arrives we deduct our success fee and transfer the balance to you within 5 working days.
If repayment is not made: We set out your options and take no further step without your instruction. Where proceedings are the right course, we work alongside qualified solicitors.
A local planning authority cannot lawfully refuse planning permission or treat a developer less favourably because the developer has exercised a legitimate contractual right. Planning decisions must be based on material planning considerations only. Any conduct to the contrary is challengeable by appeal or judicial review as an improper purpose. We address this directly in every engagement.
We also work only in our own name. Every letter to a local authority is sent by EM Development Consultants Limited, never by you and never under your company's name.
One High Court authority and three national datasets confirm that unspent contributions are held, and that councils have returned them to developers.
Our own work to date. We have reviewed 43 Section 106 agreements across 18 local authorities in England.
High Court held a repayment term can be implied into a Section 106 agreement without an express clause, but only in limited circumstances where the parties plainly intended it. Developers with express clauses remain in a materially stronger position.
80 local authorities, a third of those that responded, confirmed returning developer contributions over the preceding five years. Combined total returned: £20.6 million, against an estimated £6.3 billion held unspent nationally at that time.
Based on responses from 171 local authorities, HBF confirmed over £2.8 billion in unspent contributions held across England and Wales. Approximately 25% held beyond the five-year contractual spending period.
HBF's most recent national report found over £9 billion in unspent developer contributions held across England and Wales, £6.6 billion of that from Section 106 agreements specifically. 243 local authorities responded to the survey.
Councils cannot lawfully penalise developers for exercising a contractual right. We address this in every client communication and monitor closely for any sign of retaliatory conduct. All correspondence with the council goes out in our name, never the developer's.
We never take a one-size-fits-all approach. Every piece of correspondence we send to a local authority is specific to your agreement, your site and your circumstances. The council is given no room to respond in vague or incomplete terms.
If a council does not repay, we set out the options and act only with your agreement, working alongside qualified solicitors where proceedings are required.
Reviewing historic agreements for unspent balances is not a sideline for us, it is the whole business, at no cost or risk to you unless a sum is actually recovered. That is a different proposition to asking an existing adviser to look at it as one item among many.
EM Development Consultants Limited works only on the recovery of unspent planning contributions: Section 106 agreements in England and Wales, and Section 75 agreements in Scotland.
We bring 28 years of experience working with housebuilders and developers on new build sites, so we know how developments are delivered and what gets left unchecked once a site is complete.
Every instruction is led at director level, and we work alongside qualified solicitors where proceedings are required.
Tell us the basics and we will come back to you within 2 working days with a clear view of your recovery prospects.