Barratt Developments hopes to reduce its debts with the sale of £109 million of assets from Wilson Bowden Development, the rival builder it bought last year.

The housebuilder said today that it had exchanged contracts for the sale of Eagles Meadow shopping centre in Wrexham, for £79 million, and expects to receive £74 million on completion before the end of this year.

It also expects to raise a total of £30 million from the sale of 9.5 acres of land for a supermarket development in Chesterfield, and Atlantic Quay 4, a completed office development in Glasgow.

All the sales have been agreed since Barratt released its interim management statement last month, when the company said that further writedowns would also be required against the Wilson Bowden portfolio.

Earlier this year, Barratt was forced to renegotiate its lending terms with banks on its £1.65 billion debt, which followed the purchase of Wilson Bowden.

Talks over the sales of the remaining Wilson Bowden assets are progressing, Barratt said this morning.

Barratt bought its rival at the top of the market in February 2007, for £2.2 billion, after fending off rival bids from Sir Tom Hunter and George Wimpey.

The purchase made Barratt the largest housebuilder in the UK, overtaking Persimmon.

In the months since the acquisition, the property market has fallen into steady decline and housebuilders have been suffering.

In the interim statement last month, Mark Clare, chief executive of Barratt, said: “Conditions in the housing market are now as tough as anyone can remember with increasing pressure on prices and margins."

Shares in Barratt climbed 6.9 per cent today to 54.25p.

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