KCC Asset Sales: £84m Raised, But Full Property Ledger Remains Hidden

Kent County Council says it has raised more than £84m from surplus property disposals over five years. The trouble is not the headline number. The trouble is what the public still can’t see: the complete list of what was sold, who bought it, and how much each public asset fetched.

Kent County Council’s latest disposals paper gives us the big number, but not the full till receipt. It says KCC raised over £57m from surplus property disposals between 2021/22 and 2024/25, including nearly £22m in 2024/25. It then says £27m was achieved in 2025/26, with a further pipeline of disposals expected to raise around £17m in the next 12 months. So yes, the broad figure is right: the public estate has produced more than £84m in five years.

The council’s argument is simple enough. KCC says it owns more than 16,000 property and land assets, and when it no longer has a use for a property it has a “fiduciary duty” to dispose of it, reduce holding costs and generate capital receipts. In normal English, that means: if County Hall says it doesn’t need a building, it says it shouldn’t keep paying to hold it. Fair enough. Empty buildings cost money. But public land isn’t old office furniture. Once it’s gone, it’s usually gone for good.

The next step is bigger. KCC’s Freehold Disposals Programme 2026/27 identifies 45 assets for disposal, with a target of £49m in capital receipts and holding-cost savings of more than half a million pounds. The forecast is £17m of receipts in 2026/27, another £17m in 2027/28, and £15m in 2028/29. That is not a few unwanted cupboards and a broken photocopier. That is a county-wide sale programme.

KCC says the old “piecemeal” system is no longer effective and that a “whole programme approach” gives “greater transparency, strategic oversight” and “pace and efficiency”. That sounds lovely, like something printed on a lanyard at a local government conference. But the snag is obvious: the public gets the total programme figure, while the detailed asset list and the site-specific financial information sit in exempt appendices. We get the headline. The prices are in the back room.

The constitution point matters. KCC’s own report says its Property Management Protocol gives the Director of Infrastructure delegated authority to agree disposal terms only where the transaction is under £1m. If the value is over £1m, a Cabinet Member decision is needed. KCC also says section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972 requires councils to obtain “best consideration”, normally tested through valuation and open marketing by private treaty, tender or auction. In other words, the process should be open, evidenced and properly recorded.

So what can we actually see from the public trail? Not the full £27m. That is the problem. The publicly visible records we’ve found do not give a complete asset-by-asset reconciliation of the 2025/26 total. The clearest confirmed sale is the former Gravesend Adult Education Centre, Darnley Road, which sold at auction for £1.523m. KCC’s urgent decision says the Deputy Leader approved the sale under auction terms because the result exceeded the delegated limit underpinning the original disposal plan. The auction listing also records it as sold for £1,523,000.

Then there is 2 Grace Hill, Folkestone, the former Grace Hill Library building. KCC’s February 2026 decision had proposed open-market disposal of the Grace Hill building, but later scrutiny papers recorded that Folkestone Town Council had submitted a bid to purchase Grace Hill for a “nominal sum”. Folkestone Town Council has since said agreement has been reached, subject to contract, to acquire 2 Grace Hill at “nominal cost”, after councillors backed the move at a special meeting on 21 April 2026. That “nominal sum” is £1

Beyond that, the public trail becomes a ledger of approvals rather than completed sales. Since May 2025, KCC approvals include Thistley Hill, Melbourne Avenue, Dover; Sevenoaks Adult Education Centre, Hatton House, Bradbourne Road; land south of Pratling Street, Aylesford; the former Oasis Academy, Hextable; land at Westcott Avenue, Gravesend; former Rowhill School, Wilmington; land at West Malling Bypass and south of London Road, Leybourne; Invicta House and associated car park, Maidstone; and land at the former Spires Academy, Bredlands Lane, Westbere. These are approvals to dispose or progress disposal. They are not all proof of completed sales, and most do not show the final sale price.

Some of the public estate has already walked out of the committee papers and into the estate-agent window. Thistley Hill, Dover is being marketed by Bray Fox Smith on Rightmove as a freehold site of about 3.69 acres, including a former primary school building latterly used as a KCC office and a redundant children’s nursery. The listing shows POA, which is estate-agent shorthand for “ask nicely and bring a serious cheque book”.

Sevenoaks Adult Education Centre / Hatton House is being marketed by JLL as a freehold opportunity. JLL’s material describes a 1.77-acre site, historically used for education, with the building originally constructed in 1874. The brochure says offers are invited for the freehold interest on either an unconditional or subject-to-planning basis. So an adult education site becomes a development opportunity, which is one of those phrases that always sounds cleaner than the thing it describes.

Invicta House, Maidstone, is being marketed by Montagu Evans and also appears on Rightmove. The particulars describe a 1.40-acre town-centre site, 86,176 sq ft of office accommodation, a neighbouring multi-storey car park, vacant possession, and redevelopment potential for office refurbishment, residential, hotel or educational use, subject to planning. One moment it’s a county council office. The next it’s a “redevelopment or repositioning opportunity”. Public-sector alchemy: turn desks into yield.

For Westcott Avenue, Gravesend, we haven’t found a live sales listing, but there is a public contract trail. A notice records “Sale/Marketing of Land at Westcott Avenue Gravesend” linked to Knight Frank, and KCC’s own decision papers describe the site as being prepared for open-market disposal on an “all enquiries” basis. So there is a public approval and a public marketing-contract clue, but not yet a public-facing sale page we can point readers to.

For the remaining named sites — Pratling Street, Aylesford; former Rowhill School, Wilmington; West Malling/Leybourne land; former Oasis Academy, Hextable; and former Spires Academy land, Westbere — we have found KCC disposal approvals, but not live estate-agent or auction pages. That doesn’t mean they aren’t being marketed, prepared, negotiated, held back, or tucked behind exempt papers. It simply means the approval trail is clearer than the market trail.

And that is the real story. KCC wants the public to accept that this is strategic estate management, not a county-wide car boot sale with better stationery. It may be lawful. It may even be financially necessary. But if County Hall wants trust, it should publish a simple public ledger: asset, address, Cabinet approval, marketing agent, asking basis, final purchaser, final price, completion date, and how the receipt is used. KCC already says capital receipts are needed to support its Medium-Term Financial Plan and capital programme. Fine. Then show the public the receipt.

Because “best consideration” isn’t just a legal phrase. It is a public promise. It means Kent’s land and buildings should not drift quietly from public ownership into private hands while residents are left squinting through exempt appendices and estate-agent listings. The county estate was built up over generations. Selling parts of it may sometimes be sensible. Selling it without a clear, complete, public ledger is something else entirely.

The Shepway Vox Team

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