Just four months after it acquired St. John’s Retail Park in Bedford, Schroder Real Estate Investment Trust has completed four new signings at the site.
Existing occupiers at St John’s — which Schroder paid £31.8m for in May — are Homebase, Next, PC World, Currys and Hughes Direct. Now, under its business plan for the asset, the trust has signed two retail deals and attracted two new commercial businesses to the park.
Carpet and flooring retailer, Tapi, has agreed to take 4,860 sq ft at an annual rent of £121,500. As an incentive the firm has been offered 12 months rent free spread over the second and fourth year of the term and will move in on completion of a £30,000 upgrade of its retail warehouse unit later this month.
Recently launched Tapi is a new entrant to the market and has so far opened nine outlets, with 100 more stores planned by 2018.
Schroder has separately completed a lease extension with Maplin Electronics, which has been occupying a 4,481 sq ft unit at the park on a lease due to expire in March, 2018. That annual lease of £81,576 has been extended for five years with a six month rent free incentive. Maplin’s new lease includes a March, 2018, rent review.
Earlier in the summer the trust also secured two lettings — totalling 9,639 sq ft — in Howard House, an office building adjacent to the retail park. Combined, both leases are worth £91,106 a year. Around 3,200 sq ft remains vacant in the office block.
In a statement, Schroder Real Estate says the recent deals increase the rent at St. John’s Retail Park, after the rent free periods, to £2.2m a year. “This reflects a yield of approximately seven per cent on the gross acquisition cost totalling £32.1m,” it explains.
The activity also increases the average unexpired lease term, assuming tenants break at the earliest opportunity, to 7.1 years at the park compared with 6.9 years on acquisition.
“Further initiatives are being pursued including rent reviews, lease extensions, right sizing certain retailers and widening the planning consent in order to further increase the rental tone and improve tenant mix,” concludes the statement.
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