Property
2015: No.25= - £130m
2014: No.29 - £110m

Eric Grove, who founded Warwick-based Catesby Estates in 2005, is one of the most successful property entrepreneurs in the country with more than 50 years of industry experience.

He remains chairman of Catesby and it is keeping him busy. Work is underway on130 residential plots in Dickens Heath, Solihull and a 49-home development in Basingstoke has also begun. A major 490-home development is going ahead in Bromsgrove. The Future Point business park in Newark in Nottinghamshire is being actively marketed with units from 100,000 to 2,000,000 sq ft available.

They are just a few of Catesby’s hefty portfolio of residential, commercial and mixed use land across the UK. The company is worth around £40 million and made profits of £6.2 million in 2012-13.

One of Catesby’s flagship projects is First Point – a £200 million 120-acre mixed-use business and retail park near the M18 in Doncaster.

First Point, developed in partnership with Doncaster Metropolitan Borough Council and Yorkshire Forward, is also the home of Doncaster Chamber of Commerce and a new Morrison’s superstore.

First Point’s development and rapid big-name letting will give Eric Grove a lot of satisfaction. At 84 he still takes a keen interest in the development of the company.

The £10 million Vantage Point twin unit distribution facility near Fort Dunlop in Castle Bromwich is also a Catesby project.

Catesby has become a specialist in developing brownfield sites and in 2008 established an £80 million joint venture with Bank of Scotland to tackle brownfield sites in London and the south east. The company is also working with local authorities to provide affordable homes for the elderly and key-workers, and also flood alleviation schemes.

The company, under the direction of CEO Paul Brocklehurst, has major residential developments in Les Arches, Jersey, as well as Harpenden in Hertfordshire and Holsworthy, North Devon.

Grove – who began his career in the 1950s at Stourport-based Thomas Vale Construction – made his fortune after setting up residential property business Canberra Developments in 1968. He sold out to housebuilder Alfred McAlpine 20 years later, netting around £40 million in shares.

A former director of Coventry City FC, he now lives in Warwickshire. His other business interests include a stake in a property investment company.