Taylor Wimpey tops the dividend chart

On top of this, the ordinary dividend payout has been significantly upgraded to approximately 5 per cent of net assets - previously 2 per cent - and subject to a minimum of £150m a year; that's roughly 4.6p a share. So this means that, on the current share price, the 2016 yield will be 5.4 per cent, rising to 6.8 per cent in 2017. What's more, despite the increased returns, broker Peel Hunt forecasts that net cash could increase from £223m to about £400m by 2018, suggesting improved payouts could be possible in the future.

So where's all the money come from to make this possible? Part of the answer comes from the way Taylor Wimpey is handling its land bank. At the end of 2015, the short-term consented land bank stood at around 76,000 plots, enough for around five-and-a-half years' output at current levels. This is considered an optimum level, so new plots are being acquired on a top-up basis, which should keep a lid on spending. Set against the 13,200 housing completions last year, Taylor Wimpey managed to bring through 8,660 plots from its strategic land bank; that's plots that start without planning consent. And with the draw-through from the strategic land bank, purchases for the short-term land bank dropped in 2015 to 6,971 from 8,315 a year earlier. Meanwhile, the strategic pipeline is one of the biggest in the sector, containing around 107,000 plots.

This means that when it comes to replenishing, Taylor Wimpey can be very choosy about what it buys. The cash cost of maintaining the land back is also being kept down by extremely benign land price inflation. Indeed, last year land cost per unit sold actually fell from £45,100 to £42,400. This helped the company achieve operating margins of around 20 per cent last year and a return on capital employed in excess of 27 per cent.

Profits and cash generation was also helped by an 8 per cent increase in selling prices last year to £230,000. That said, build cost per unit rose from £112,900 to £121,900 as a result of higher specifications and rising labour costs. But cost inflation in the current year is expected to moderate to 3-4 per cent.

Last year's strong performance has continued into this year, despite the popular media's obsession with the EU referendum. Private net reservation rates rose in the first four months to 0.8 sales per outlet per week from 0.76 a year earlier, while cancellation rates remained historically low at 11 per cent. The total forward order book stood at 8,811 homes, up from 8,200, while the order book was up by nearly 17 per cent at £2.17bn. This means that just four months into the new year, the company is already 70 per cent forward sold for private completions. And after many years in the doldrums, the Spanish operation is starting to recover. Completions in 2015 rose to 251 homes from 164 a year earlier, and average selling prices increased from €250,000 (£195,000) to €315,000. Even more encouraging; operating profit more than doubled to £10m.

While housebuilders are cyclical by nature, bear points for the sector at the moment are largely conspicuous by their absence, although perhaps a vote to leave the EU could put constraints on the ability to hire skilled workers from Europe, which would exacerbate wage inflation. The same decision might also prompt the Bank of England to push interest rates higher. However, it has to be said that neither of these is likely to be an immediate problem.