According to law firm EMW, commercial property planning applications in the UK have leapt by around 16 per cent during the last year.
In their research, EMW counted that 531 applications for medium scale (10,000 sqft and above) commercial property developments had been given the green light during the last quarter of 2010. Which is up from 459 from the equivalent period of 2009.
Despite this positive news, the EMW research declares that the number of commercial property applications granted in the last quarter of 2010, although a rise on 2009 levels, remains lower than the 679 commercial property developments recorded in 2008.
Along with this, EMW also stated that large scale (100,000 sqft and above) commercial property planning applications, which have been accepted, have also grown. With research revealing that 120 projects sealed planning approval in the final quarter of 2010, compared with 104 in the last three months of 2009.
Within the research, EMW found that there is some positive news for the office sector, with 148 planning applications recorded in quarter 4 of 2010, up from 126 in the corresponding period of 2009.
Giles Ferrin, from EMW, believes this is significant news for the commercial property sector and is very encouraging for all involved in commercial property, either directly or indirectly. Ferrin said: ‘Investors are definitely back in the commercial property market and that could mean the first tentative sign of green shoots’ for the industry.
Whilst Giles Ferrin is right to be positive, we must be careful not to get too excited by this news. After all, in order for growth to be long term, it must be illustrated over a period of time longer than one quarter. And, as the report states, granted planning applications in the commercial property sector are yet to reach the levels which were recorded just two years ago.
