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.
Clarion Partners Europe has acquired a logistics facility in Haydock, near Warrington, for £50.8M.
The vendor is Warrington Borough Council for a scheme constructed in 2019 that is a 381K SF property fully let to Movianto UK, a healthcare supply chain service, on a 15-year lease, with a rent review due in July.
Following the deal, Clarion Partners Europe has invested £170M on behalf of its UK-only logistics fund in five months, amassing a circa 1.2M SF, 11-asset portfolio.
“Haydock is an outstanding UK logistics location in one of Europe’s most densely populated and undersupplied regions, which has experienced significant rental growth outperformance in recent years,” Clarion Partners Europe Director Florina Capraru said in a statement.
DEALS
Royal London Asset Management Property has expanded its footprint at Abingdon Business Park, Oxfordshire, with the acquisition of the 77K SF Eyston Way industrial scheme and has secured planning permission for a 24K SF mid-tech unit space. It has also completed the refurbishment of a 54K SF building and signed an agreement with Oxford Nanopore Technologies.
Located on a 50-acre site adjacent to the A34 and just outside of Abingdon town centre, Abingdon Business Park includes 550K SF of industrial and innovation real estate comprising research and development, life sciences, tech, engineering and manufacturing tenants.
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Fiera Real Estate and Wrenbridge have purchased a 5-acre site on Pin Green Industrial Estate in an off-market transaction that is expected to result in a 120K SF logistics facility.
The scheme will be specified to energy performance certificate A and BREEAM Excellent, will have 10 dock levellers and two level access doors, and will offer 12.5-metre internal eaves, the partners said.
The latest acquisition follows several purchases for properties in Hemel Hempstead, Hayes, Waltham Cross and adjoining sites in Heathrow to grow the committed development pipeline between the partnership in the south-east.
LEASING
Landsec has signed three deals with Spanish retail group Inditex at Bluewater in Kent and St. David’s in Cardiff. The deals reflect Inditex’s focus on creating fewer, bigger and digitally connected stores, Landsec said in the announcement.
Pull & Bear will make its Welsh debut in St. David’s, where the brand has taken 8,500 SF across two floors, bringing its total multibrand footprint at the centre to more than 60K SF. Inditex will also open a 10K SF Pull & Bear at Bluewater in Kent, along with a 10K SF Bershka.
Inditex will also open a previously announced 46K SF flagship Zara at Trinity Leeds later this summer, upsizing and relocating into the centre from the city.
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Grosvenor has appointed Hanover Green Retail as the sole agents for all leasing across the south of its Mayfair portfolio, which encompasses Mount Street, Carlos Place and South Audley Street, W1.
Mount Street is known as a luxury retail neighbourhood and is home to a variety of international brands spanning retail, beauty and hospitality, such as Toteme’s first European flagship store, The Mount Street Restaurant and Dr Barbara Sturm Skincare.
Hanover Green’s appointment follows strong first-quarter performance across the south of Mayfair, with footfall rising by 11% in the first three months of 2024 compared to the same period last year. Mount Street has seen a 4% rise in retail sales over the same period, according to a statement from Grosvenor.
FINANCE
CBRE Investment Management, on behalf of the CBRE UK Affordable Housing Fund, has completed a forward-funding transaction with Vistry Group to acquire 153 affordable homes in Sussex.
The s106 homes are located at The Gateway, Bexhill-on-Sea, and will provide 89 affordable rented homes and 64 shared ownership homes, heated by a community heating hub. All homes will be managed on behalf of CBRE Investment Management by Pinnacle Spaces.
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Zenzic Capital has completed more than £17M of development finance to fund the construction of 43 residential open market properties across five UK schemes.
The five projects are all with different small to medium enterprise housebuilders and have a total gross domestic value of more than £25M, according to Zenic.
Projects include the development of five detached houses and nine new-build houses in East Ayton, North Yorkshire; the construction of 12 new houses near Brentwood, Essex; the conversion of a former pub in Welham Green, Hertfordshire, into three apartments and the development of six further houses on the site; and the conversion of a former pub in Seaford, East Sussex, into four apartments, with four duplex houses and a retail unit.
PEOPLE
Canary Wharf Group Investment Holdings Chairman Sir George Iacobescu will retire from the board on 1 July and will be succeeded by Sir Nigel Wilson as nonexecutive chairman.
Iacobescu has been a driving force behind the redevelopment of London’s Docklands since 1988 and became chief executive of CWG in 1997 and its chairman in 2011. Wilson is best known as chief executive of Legal & General, a position he held for almost 12 years.
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Barings has hired Rupert Gill, the former head of European real estate debt at BlackRock, to head up portfolio management for European real estate debt.
In his new role, Gill will provide oversight of strategy development and the execution of investment solutions. He will be based in London and report to Nasir Alamgir, head of U.S. and European real estate debt.
