Developer And Private Equity Giant Head North For £245M Office Refurb

U.S. private equity firm Apollo Global Management has teamed up with developer Allied London to buy a vacant Manchester office scheme that it would refurbish and re-let. 

Apollo and Allied are frontrunners to buy One Hardman Boulevard in Manchester from bank NatWest for around £50M, React News reported. If the deal goes through, it will be one of the largest office refurb deals this year anywhere in the country. 

One Hardman Boulevard is a 350K SF office building in Manchester’s Spinningfields business district. It was completed in 2004 and occupied by NatWest on a 35-year lease. 

The bank bought the building in 2021 for £292M, the largest single-office deal in Manchester history and one of the largest ever outside of London. It has since decided to terminate its lease, vacate the building and put it up for sale. 

A refurbishment of the building could cost around £250 per SF, or about £90M, giving the overhauled scheme a value of about £245M, or £700 per SF, if rents for the best-quality Manchester office buildings continue to rise, React reported. 

Options for the building include splitting up floorplates so each floor could accommodate four occupiers and incorporating amenities like a gym and café, Place North West reported.

Apollo has become a bigger lender in UK real estate in recent years, particularly in the office sector. The investment would highlight that global investors are confident enough to back big office conversion deals in the UK.

Allied London, led by Mike Ingall, is one of the UK’s best-known developers and has a particularly strong association with Manchester and Spinningfields. 

Cushman & Wakefield is advising NatWest.