Southern Grove appoints Shoosmiths’ Bill Howard as Group General Counsel

By Bridging Loan Directory 10th September 2019

Property developer Southern Grove has appointed property industry veteran Bill Howard as Group General Counsel.

Bill joins from the law firm Shoosmiths LLP where he had been a Partner since 2006.

The role of Group General Counsel is a newly created post for Southern Grove, which continues to expand with a pipeline of projects across its residential, hospitality and residential arm, as well as its Purpose Built Student Accommodation (PBSA) division, Future Generation.

Bill has specialised in property development throughout his career and has wide commercial experience, having worked for housing associations, local authorities and house builders.

His areas of expertise include joint ventures, large acquisitions and two areas — options and conditional contracts — that are key to the way Southern Grove scales its business and moves land forward for development quickly.

Andrew Southern, Chairman of developer Southern Grove, commented:

“Bill has unrivalled experience in the property sphere and we’ll be relying on his incisive legal knowledge to help us bring forward an ever expanding pipeline of schemes.

“We specialise in options and conditional contracts, which are two of Bill’s key areas of expertise. We find these property development techniques create the most fair value for all parties, including land owners, and bring viable sites forward for planning more quickly. It is here that Bill’s expertise is really going to come to the fore.”

Bill Howard, Group General Counsel, Southern Grove, added:

“Southern Grove is one of a new breed of developers that has dispensed with the old way of doing things and their methods sit neatly in what has undeniably become a sweet spot of mine.

“There’s a fantastic and expanding team here with huge ambition and I’m looking forward to being a part of that.”