Ashen Capital backs residential land promotion specialist Merrow Wood - 5 June 2025

Ashen backs land promoter in second corporate deal

Published by Green Street News on 5 Jun 2025 | 08:15 | London | by Guy Montague-Jones

Alex Price and Steven Wright’s firm to fuel growth of Merrow Wood

Ashen Capital’s Alex Price and Steven Wright, and Merrow Wood’s John Kennedy and Daniel Webber

• What Ashen Capital backs residential land promotion specialist Merrow Wood
• Why Investment will enable business to grow and take advantage of the government’s planning reforms
• What next Ashen is planning to invest in other property businesses with strong growth potential

Ashen Capital, the real estate venture capital firm founded by former Fiera Real Estate duo Alex Price and Steven Wright, has made its second corporate investment, Green Street News can reveal.

The firm is backing Merrow Wood, a specialist in residential land and planning promotion set up in 2020 by Daniel Webber and John Kennedy, who worked together at Cala Homes and both have extensive experience at major housebuilders.

As part of the deal, Merrow Wood has been seeded with an initial £2m of equity to promote land in five locations in the South East, which together will enable the development of around 500 houses over the next five years. Over these five years, the equity commitment will grow to up to £5m to support the delivery of as many as 1,500 homes.

The aim is to take the sites through the planning system and then sell them on to housebuilders. Merrow Wood is positioned to benefit from the government’s planning reforms, including changes to the NPPF, designed to make it easier to gain planning consent on so-called “grey belt” land.

The focus will be sites on previously developed land that can accommodate up to around 200 units.

Webber said: “Our mission has always been to unlock the potential of land in ways that are genuinely beneficial for landowners, developers and homeowners. By leveraging our own balance sheet together with Ashen Capital’s, we are now in a stronger position than ever to deliver on that promise.”

This is the second deal from Ashen Capital, following on from its backing of Sibner Investment Management, which provides development finance to SME housebuilders.

Ashen’s first two corporate investments are linked to residential development

Residential is a favoured sector for Ashen, although it is open to supporting businesses in other parts of the market.

Explaining why the firm decided to back Merrow Wood, Price said: “They were at exactly the right stage for us – they’re up and running, they’ve got a track record and enormous capability. With our capital and knowledge, we think we can take them to the next level.”

Price and Wright worked together at Fiera Real Estate and Palmer Capital for 15 years, and joined forces to create Ashen Capital, which aims to provide venture capital backing to asset management and development companies.

The West End-based investor will typically take stakes of 15% to 30% in asset managers and 25% to 33% in developers. Ashen aims to be a “strategic investor” that will help provide start-up cash and build balance sheet capital to utilise alongside firms’ future joint venture partners.

It plans to make initial investments in three to five companies.