Developer Is Exiting Smaller London Buildings With Fewer Repositioning Opportunities Derwent London, the listed London focused developer and investor, has exchanged to sell its 63,170-square-foot freehold interest in 19 Charterhouse Street EC1 in London for £54 million. The purchaser was a family office advised by Morgan Capital and BNF Capital. The building, which was bought in November 2013 for £41.3 million, is occupied by the London College of Accountancy on a lease expiring in August 2025. The passing rent is £2.6 million a year. The disposal price represents a 4.6% net initial yield to the purchaser, a capital value of £855 per square foot and reflects a marginal discount to June 2022 book value. The sale is one of a handful to have exchanged in the capital in 2023 as the market looks for momentum after a slowdown towards the end of last year. Paul Williams, chief executive of Derwent London, said the sale forms part of an ongoing strategy [...]

By Mark Stansfield CoStar Analytics 16 January 2023 | 09:00 London office investment slumped in the final months of 2022 as rising interest rates and uncertainty over pricing brought the market to a virtual standstill, according to CoStar data. Less than £500 million of London offices changed hands in the fourth quarter, a drop of more than 80% on the £2.8 billion spent in the third quarter and more than 90% down on the £6.4 billion transacted in the first quarter of 2022, when hopes for a strong post-pandemic recovery unleashed a wave of blockbuster deals. The figures make the fourth quarter the weakest quarter in more than 20 years. Volumes were less than half those recorded in the lockdown-hit second quarter of 2020 and comfortably below the levels in the depths of the financial crisis at the start of 2009. Annual volumes remained on par with those in 2021 with just over £13 billion changing hands thanks to [...]