If land is to be developed or redeveloped, the end "product" must have a value which is greater, or at least equivalent to, its cost of construction. Otherwise it simply won't get developed. It really isn't rocket science.

In recent decades, with the surge of house prices outpacing development costs, developers were asked to contribute towards community infrastructure costs and also supply quotas of affordable housing, on the back of the land value surplus.

However, with the fall in house values and a lack of subsidy grants for affordable housing, the cost to build dwellings in many parts of Kent, particularly the coastal areas, means we are seeing more and more negative land values across the county. Without government financial intervention, such areas are unlikely to see much new development after the end of this year when affordable housing grants promised at the beginning of the year run out.

Recent research by Shelter indicated a cluster of Kent and Essex coastal towns were becoming repossession hotspots partly due to the increasing levels of unemployment in those areas.

This in turn will result in an increased demand for affordable rental accommodation but with the intermediate rents set as high as 80 per cent of open market rent. This, combined with reduced housing benefits on the horizon, could make homelessness in Kent a real issue.

In central and western parts of the county, together with the Canterbury area, values tend to be higher and more readily outweigh costs. MP Grant Shapps recently announced the potential sale of up to £10 billion worth of surplus public land for new housing; no doubt this will include the Fort Halstead Ministry of Defence unit to the north of Sevenoaks which is planned to shut down. Clearly large tracts of public sector land will appeal to national developers.

The smaller, regional or local developer, who historically has been responsible for the construction of most of the houses in Britain, will hardly get a look in and even if there were smaller tracts of land available to be built, the banks are very constrained in their lending.

The nature of housing is also changing. There is decreasing interest in development schemes for flats mainly due to the poor cash flow and lack of equity among first and second time buyers, compared with family housing where there is likely to be sufficient equity from house purchasers in order to obtain mortgage finance.

In places such as Maidstone, we are unlikely to see much more development of flats around the riverside but there is a strong demand for house building on the green edges around the town.

Of course, Kent continues to have high aspirations for the redevelopment of its regeneration areas, particularly around the Thames Gateway and the north Kent coastal areas of Thanet and Dover, helped by the proposed Local Enterprise Partnership. Without funding, either in the form of grant aid subsidies or by bank finance, progress will be very constrained until we have a positive return to where we were in 2007 - and accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers is suggesting that could be delayed for another 10 years!

It would be a pity for the Garden of England to fall into a neglected state and it is vital employment opportunities must be recreated at the earliest opportunity to drive our regional economy forward.

n David Parry is a partner based at the Maidstone office of Cluttons LLP. He can be contacted on david.parry@cluttons.com