A site earmarked for industrial development on the edge of Devizes, where developer Redrow Homes wants to build houses, had offers from three companies, a planning hearing heard.

Wiltshire Council planners refused an application by Redrow to change the land at the former Bureau West site in Horton Road from light industrial to residential after learning about the offers that had been made by local companies IDDEA, Oakford and CMD Recruitment.

At a hearing into the appeal by Redrow, held at Devizes Corn Exchange on Tuesday, Rachel Yeomans, senior planner at Wiltshire Council, said: “We feel the site is very important in terms of contributing to the supply, variety and flexibility of employment sites in Wiltshire. That is borne out by the fact that there are three offers on the table by prospective purchasers.”

Redrow rejected the offers because it said it felt that they were lower than the guide price and said they were made after it had submitted the planning application seeking to change the land from industrial to residential.

Redrow is finishing building 118 homes at the former Bureau West site. A care home is also to be built at the site.

The appeal will determine if Redrow can build another 25 homes on the remaining 1.4 acres of land earmarked for light industrial use.

The hearing heard that Red-row agreed a price of £500,000 from local company Metabolics in March 2010 for the site, two months after it was marketed for businesses, but Metabolics pulled out in June 2010.

Redrow said they did not receive other offers so applied to change the land to residential in March 2012. IDDEA submitted its offer for the site the same month, unaware of the planning application, and offers from Oakford, an IT company, and CMD Recruitment followed.

Ian Dunstone, managing director of IDDEA, a sustainable technology company based at Hopton Industrial Estate, Devizes, told the hearing he offered £180,000 per acre for the site via an agent.

The offers from Oakford and CMD Recruitment were not disclosed at the hearing but Redrow’s land director in the south west, Lee Hawker, said all three offers were below the guide price of £300,000 and £350,000 per acre.

Mr Hawker said: “We felt the offers we received were below the market value for a prestigious site.

“If it was your house, would you sell it at 40 or 50 per cent below the market value?”

Redrow’s planning consultant Andrew Cockett told the hearing that the site was needed for housing as other sites in east Wiltshire may not be delivered in the next five years, and also said there was an over supply of employment land in the area and the former Bureau West site was not needed for industrial use.

The planning inspector, David Morgan, will make his decision at a later date.