This Week's London Deal Sheet
The deal sheet is a weekly compilation of Greater London and beyond's biggest leases, sales, financing deals, construction updates and personnel moves. Have news you’d like to submit? Email mark.faithfull@bisnow.com
Property investment and asset management specialist Addington Capital and its joint venture partners have sold 1-27 Station Parade Elm Park, Hornchurch to Property Development Solutions Europe for £12M.
Elm Park is a mixed-use scheme comprising 20 retail units, anchored by a 7K SF Co-op store, and 31 residential units. The property has been actively asset managed by Addington Capital since its purchase in 2014, and through a reconfiguration of the site and rolling refurbishments on the residential units, rents have increased 73.5% between purchase and disposal the company said.
“Our business plan for Elm Park has been successful," Addington Capital partner David Dalrymple said. "The scheme is fully let, and we reached the right stage in our cycle to sell. We believe there is good future redevelopment potential for the scheme to the rear and the potential to add an additional storey of residential to the existing structure.”
Agent for the vendors was Allsop.
FINANCE
Later living developer and operator Untold Living has received backing from investment firm Matter Real Estate to acquire and develop multiple schemes across the UK.
The company has acquired Chantry Court in Westbury, Wiltshire, as its first site. The 64-unit retirement village will undergo a refurbishment programme to improve existing amenities, including a restaurant with sun terrace, a bar, lounges, a library, a hair salon and a cinema.
Untold Living has also secured two sites in Crawley, West Sussex, and Newport, Shropshire, for two new later living schemes. Each is set to deliver between 100 and 120 units, comprising both apartments and bungalows.
The company is targeting a gross development value of £300M for its initial development pipeline. It is seeking to acquire other suitable sites across the UK to expand its portfolio.
The firm is headed by Russell Jewell, AEW’s former head of private equity funds, and Marcus Davidson-Wright, formerly managing director and head of debt and fund operations at AEW.
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Real estate development lending platform Precede Capital Partners, in partnership with Japanese bank Nomura, has provided a £227M, four-year whole loan facility to Downing Living, the residential-focused division of property developer and operator Downing.
The facility will be used to finance the construction of First Street, a multifamily development in Central Manchester.
This deal is the first originated and arranged by Precede Capital since it announced its partnership with QuadReal Property Group and concurrent rebrand from Précis Capital Partners in January 2023. The partnership saw QuadReal acquire a shareholding in the firm and commit up to £1B to deploy into its development loans.
Consisting of 1,790 units across three buildings, the First Street development will be targeted at new graduates and young professionals, with units ranging from studio apartments to five-bedroom shared accommodation. Completion of Phase 1 is scheduled for August 2024, with Phase 2 scheduled for delivery in March 2025.
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Silbury Finance, the Oaktree Capital Management-backed development lender, has passed £500M of committed lending in the UK living sector with the provision of a £64M loan to a joint venture established by Elysian Residences and Senior Living Investment Partners, a partnership between Pension Insurance Corporation and Octopus Real Estate.
It will fund the acquisition and development of a 124-residence luxury retirement scheme by Elysian Residences in How Wood, St Albans.
Launched in January 2021, Silbury has originated £554M of new finance across the retirement living (47%) and build-to-sell (53%) sectors, with a gross asset value of more than £800M, the company said.
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Real estate investment manager AEW has secured a new €375M separate account investment mandate from Samsung SRA Asset Management.
Over the course of 2023 and 2024 AEW will look to invest in repriced European core and core-plus assets and the mandate will seek to invest alongside other investors in a co-investment strategy, increasing the overall investment volume.
The investment strategy is primarily focused on office and logistics, but will also consider residential (build-to-rent and student accommodation), life sciences and other asset classes across Europe.
Geographically, the mandate will target Europe’s tier 1 and capital cities across Europe, with a focus on strong and liquid markets. The UK is an immediate priority, plus Germany, Spain and France, AEW said.
DEVELOPMENT
Residential developer HUB has launched HubCap, a wholly owned subsidiary of HUB, set up to deliver low-carbon urban living projects in key UK cities.
HubCap said that its focus initially is on the delivery of emerging models such as aparthotels and co-living, keeping carbon budgets low by prioritising the reuse of existing buildings, as well as optimising operational carbon savings. Many of the schemes will be retrofits of buildings that are currently offices or other commercial uses.
HubCap officially launched with the acquisition of three sites in London’s zone 1 and Edinburgh, with a combined total gross development value of circa £75M. The two Edinburgh projects are a former whiskey warehouse in Leith and printing press in New Town. The London site, located on Ludgate Hill, was previously a bank.
The business has an active pipeline of projects in central London totalling £155M. Other UK cities that HubCap is exploring are Brighton, Bath, Cambridge, Glasgow, Manchester, Oxford and York.
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The Mercers’ Company has completed the final phase of its refurbishment programme at Becket House, its circa 42K SF of prime office space in the City. Becket House is now fully let.
Becket House has been refurbished and repositioned over the last three years, with the final 21K SF having undergone a £6M refurbishment, encompassing three office space floors, the reception and the addition of new cycling facilities and is adjacent to Bank station at 36 Old Jewry.
The Mercers’ Company City portfolio also includes the Whittington Building, Frederick’s Place. This new 30K SF office scheme has been designed by Stanton Williams and is due for completion in early 2024.
OCCUPIERS
Teesside University is to launch its new London base at Here East, the innovation and tech campus based in the Olympic Park.
Here East is home to a number of global technology companies, startups, academic institutions and creative businesses, including Staffordshire University London and LMA.
Teesside University already has strategic partnerships in Africa, Europe and South Asia and Teesside University London’s initial offering of courses will include business, computer games & animation and computer science.
PARTNERSHIPS
Property consultancy Knight Frank, and Berkadia, a joint venture of Berkshire Hathaway and Jefferies Financial Group, have announced a new alliance to develop and provide capital markets services.
Berkadia is a U.S.-based capital markets advisory firm and the Knight Frank Berkadia alliance means Knight Frank now has three U.S.-based partners — Berkadia, Cresa and Douglas Elliman.
PEOPLE
Investment manager Nuveen Real Estate has appointed Randy Giraldo to the role of head of Europe, overseeing the expansion of Nuveen’s global platform in the region and working alongside regional and global sector heads to identify investment opportunities.
Giraldo will be based in Nuveen’s London office. Most recently, he was the lead portfolio manager for the TIAA Real Estate account, a diversified private real estate fund with over $30B in assets under management.
Nuveen’s European real estate business currently manages $24.4B of assets across all sectors of commercial property.
