Schroder Real Estate: Regional Office Property Unit Trust acquires Earl Grey House in Newcastle for £11.9 million

LONDON, 08-Feb-2016 — /EuropaWire/ — The Regional Office Property Unit Trust, advised and managed by Schroder Real Estate, has acquired Earl Grey House in Newcastle from a private vendor for £11.9 million. The price reflects a net initial yield of 6.6% and a reversionary yield of approximately 8.5%.

Earl Grey House is an office and leisure property totalling 58,803 sq ft over basement, ground and four upper floors and is located in a prime position on the corner of Grey Street and Market Street. The freehold property is multi-let to 10 tenants including Rathbones, Grant Thornton, Costa Coffee and Harry’s Bar with an average unexpired lease term, assuming all tenant breaks are exercised, of approximately 14 years. The property is 30% vacant as a percentage of rental value.

Nick Montgomery, Head of UK Real Estate Investment at Schroders, said:

“This is the second acquisition for the Regional Office Property Unit Trust that launched in December 2015 with £100 million of funding. The fund is capitalising on increasing rental growth in cities and towns with strong and diversified local economies that have an undersupply of good quality office property.” 

Tom Newman, Investment Manager at Schroder Real Estate, added:

“We have a great opportunity to reposition Earl Grey House in the market by carrying out a high quality refurbishment of the vacant office space and increasing rents from the current tone of £17.50 per sq ft. We will offer refurbished office suites of between 1,900 sq ft and 7,500 sq ft which should capture current demand against the backdrop of limited supply of Grade A space in Newcastle.”

CBRE and Steadman Brierley acted for Schroder Real Estate and Knight Frank acted for the vendor.

For further information, please contact:

Estelle Bibby
Tel: +44 (0)20 7658 3431/
estelle.bibby@schroders.com

Notes to Editors

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Schroder Real Estate

Schroders has managed real estate funds since 1971 and currently has £12.4 billion[i] (€16.8 billion /US$18.7 billion) of gross real estate assets under management as at 30 September 2015.

Most of the property funds referred to are unauthorised collective investment schemes as defined in the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000. Promotion of these funds is restricted and access to full information about these funds is only available to those exempt from the restriction.

For further information about Schroders’ property business visit www.schroders.com/realestate

Schroders plc

Schroders is a global asset management company with £294.8 billion (EUR 400.0 billion/$446.5 billion) under management as at 30 September 2015.  Our clients are major financial institutions including pension funds, banks and insurance companies, local and public authorities, governments, charities, high net worth individuals and retail investors.

With one of the largest networks of offices of any dedicated asset management company, we operate from 37 offices in 27 countries across Europe, the Americas, Asia and the Middle East.  Schroders has developed under stable ownership for over 200 years and long-term thinking governs our approach to investing, building client relationships and growing our business.

Further information about Schroders can be found at www.schroders.com.

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