The off-market takeover of a property company has given an investment trust control of a Cambridgeshire retail warehouse park.
Highcroft Investments — through its property owning subsidiary, Rodenhurst Estates — paid £8.5m to buy out all six private shareholders of BL (Wisbech) Ltd, and its wholly owned subsidiary Belgrave Land (Wisbech) Ltd. Both companies owned a single asset, the Belgrave Retail Park in Wisbech.
Rodenhurst has raised a £7.5m loan to help finance the takeover of the 56,082 sq ft retail park. Claimed to produce an annual income of £620,585, the majority of its tenants have at least 10 years to run on their leases. These include home furnishing chain Dunelm, Halfords, Carpetright, Pets at Home and Currys PC World.
Highcroft Investments chief executive, Simon Gill, said he was pleased: “We have increased the retail warehouse sector weighting of our portfolio with what can be considered a very attractive yield in today’s market and with a good line-up of tenants.
“Being able to do an off-market deal in the current climate was very unusual and we were happy to be in a position to take advantage of the situation,” he added.
“I consider this an excellent addition to Highcroft’s portfolio, with the average weighted unexpired term on the leases offering further development opportunities.” Just over a mile south of Wisbech town centre, Belgrave Park is adjacent to a second retail-led park with Tesco, Lidl, Brantano and Farmfoods as its anchor tenants.
The London Stock Exchange-listed Highcroft held 19 property assets prior to its Wisbech acquisition. With a combined value of more than £46.5m, all its previous holdings are single-building investments let to high profile tenants, such as the BBC, Parcelforce and Arriva Trains.
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