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Kingsbridge acquires mixed use investment

February 27, 2018

Kingsbridge Ltd acquires a mixed use investment on Uxbridge High Street for £9.44 million

Kingsbridge are pleased to announce the purchase of 1 High Street, 5 Vine Street and The Leisure Building in Uxbridge.

The property comprises a 42,426 sq ft mixed use building prominently situated opposite the Intu Shopping centre and only a minute’s walk from the Tube station. Uxbridge town centre is a thriving and well connected business centre with the retail amenity provided by the Intu Shopping Centre and the High Street, which includes restaurants such as Wagamama, Bella Italia and Zizzi’s.

The property comprises an office of 20,269 sq ft arranged over four floors, an RBS bank of 3,885 sq ft and gym of 18,272 sq ft. The office space has excellent car-parking with a ratio of 1:257 sq ft and is arranged on ground and basement levels with nearby ancillary parking.

The purchase price of £9.44M reflects a net initial yield of 7.17% and a capital value of £223 psf. Following letting of the vacant office space the running yield will rise to 7.5% with a final reversion over 8.00%.

Simon Glenn, Partner at DTRE, said: “We see an opportunity to re-brand and re-position this asset within the office market to offer affordable contemporary space with exposed ceilings and a design focus that gives unique character. This type of space attracts an increasingly wider base of occupiers, as opposed to just the trendy media types, as more businesses find an attractive work environment is a key aspect of employee retention and improves their bottom line.”

Oli Marcroft, Associate Partner at KLM Retail, added: “The property comprises an attractive mixed used building in a strong London suburb. On the retail and leisure occupational side, the RBS bank offers the flexibility of a re-gear or a more comprehensive redevelopment to restaurant use given its prominence to the High Street. We understand this is a strong performing site for Trugym with the use complementing the rest of the building.”

Rupert Langdon, Investment Director at Kingsbridge said: “The mixed-use nature of this opportunity provides Kingsbridge with an opportunity to add value whilst 80% of the income is underpinned by the strong covenants of Virgin Active, The London Borough of Hillingdon and RBS. The current average office rent is £24.00 psf which offers a significant reversion based on our business plan to comprehensively refurbish the building to provide small 5,500 sq ft ‘design lead’ floorplates at affordable rents in the late £20’s undercutting grade A space which has achieved rents of £35.00 psf. With future long term revenue streams from the gym and high street unit as a well as a multi-let town centre office, we feel the building has excellent prospects for capital growth.”

Mark Hooper, Estates Director at Kingsbridge, said: “We are very pleased to have secured this investment opportunity that employs the strengths of Kingsbridge’s ‘hands on’ asset management skills and have now broken into the Greater London / M25 market which we like on account of strong demographics, the loss of affordable office space to PDR, as well as the fundamental connectivity to Heathrow, the M25 and Central London.”

DTRE & KLM Retail acted for Kingsbridge Estates Ltd.