Ideal Homes

History

Ideal Homes, as it was generally known, was incorporated in 1929 as New Ideal Homesteads. Its driving force for over thirty years was Leo Meyer, a one-time assistant surveyor for Erith Council. He started building at Bexleyheath in the 1920s as Blackwell & Meyer but his first attempts ended in failure. Starting again in 1929, Meyer formed a partnership with Philip Shephard, an inspector with the Royal Exchange. Ideal's expansion was rapid and in 1933 it sold over 4,000 houses in estates around London.

A public flotation was obtained in May 1934, the new holding company being named Ideal Building & Land Development. Housing volumes continued to expand and estates were now being built outside London, particularly in the midlands: Furnell put the figure at 5,500 in 1934 and in the mid-1930s sales were estimated at 5–7,000 a year, more than twice the size of its nearest competitors. Jackson regarded Ideal as “perhaps the most prolific of all the London developers of the thirties”.

In contrast to the physical growth in the business, profits fell sharply after the flotation and the dividend was cut two years in succession; the shares fell by almost 90 per cent from their offer price amidst suggestions by The Investors’ Review of substantial share sales by the directors. Philip Shephard resigned as joint managing director as did the chairman. Meyer had to use his own financial resources as bank guarantees.

With war approaching, Ideal turned its resources to construction for the nation's defences although, unlike other leading housebuilders, Ideal did not continue as a contractor when peace returned. Ideal had already been changing its emphasis towards the purchase and sale of tenanted properties and, with building controls severely restricting the opportunities for private housebuilding after the war, that continued to be Ideal's focus. In addition, Ideal's subsidiary Carlton Contractors built substantial numbers of houses for local authorities. Leo Meyer himself, dissatisfied with the Labour Government's approach to private enterprise, left the UK in 1948 for South Africa where he formed a local New Ideal Homesteads.

In 1953, Meyer returned to the UK just as building controls were finally dismantled and Ideal moved back into private estate development with considerable speed. By the start of the 1960s, Ideal was selling around 2–3,000 houses a year, second only to George Wimpey. However, after a long illness, Leo Meyer died in 1961 and Ideal failed to share in the growth of the private housing market; indeed an increase in interest rates in 1966 took sales down to little more than 1,100. In 1967 the weakened firm was bought by Trafalgar House.