Acquisitions & Planning
Workspace Group PLC
11 April 2006
WORKSPACE ANNOUNCES FIVE ACQUISITIONs
AND SUCCESSFUL PLANNING CONSENT
Workspace Group PLC ('Workspace'), the leading provider of flexible business
accommodation to small and medium sized enterprises in London today announces an
update on property investments made in the last quarter of its financial year.
Acquisitions
Since 1 January 2006, Workspace has invested £32 million in five new property
acquisitions which compliment its existing portfolio of sites in London. The
properties are:
•Sundial Court, Tolworth in Kingston upon Thames - a modern courtyard
office scheme of twenty units totalling 26,174 sq ft bought for £5.15
million and yielding 7.5% with rental guarantees on the vacant units.
•Horton Road Industrial Estate, West Drayton, Hillingdon. This property
comprises a 1950s industrial estate of 41,495 sq ft in nine units on a site
of 1.9 acres. The purchase price was £4.037 million. The initial yield is
7.2%.
•Park Royal Portfolio, NW10 - a portfolio of five small unit industrial
and office buildings, including the well known Park Royal Business Centre,
9-17 Park Royal Road. The total floorspace is 85,568 sq ft which produces a
rental income of £827,645 per annum and is currently 89% occupied. This
represents an average passing rent of £10.80 sq.ft. The purchase price was
£14 million. The net initial yield is 5.6% rising to a potential of 7.2%.
The property also benefits from planning consents for roof top extensions,
which will increase the scale of the lettable space by 32,262 sq ft.
•10 Bowling Green lane, Clerkenwell, EC1 - a former late Victorian school
which has been converted to provide 13,933 sq ft of small unit offices in
eleven units. The property is situated immediately adjacent to Workspace's
Clerkenwell Workshops scheme on Clerkenwell Close. The building has been
acquired for £4.5 million. The initial yield is 5.5% with one unit vacant.
This is expected to rise on rent reversions to 7%.
•Langdale House, 11 Marshalsea Rd, Borough, SE1 - This property has been
acquired from Spacia. It comprises a late Victorian warehouse which has been
converted into forty two office suites and five meeting rooms totalling
12,282 sq ft. The acquisition cost was £4 million. Workspace expects that
the property will generate a net income of £278,000 the first year,
representing a net initial yield of 6.6%. This is expected to rise to in
excess of 8%.
Planning Approval
Workspace also announces that working with its partner Ashford Developments
Limited, its planning application for a mixed use scheme at its site on the
Thurston Road Industrial Estate, Lewisham, SE13 has been conditionally approved.
The Lewisham Planning Committee has resolved to grant outline consent for
Workspace's plan to redevelop the 2.6 acre site to create a scheme that includes
98,642 sq ft of retail space laid out on two levels, 18,051 sq ft of live-work
space and 271 residential units. The new scheme will be one of the first
developments in the UK to combine large format non-food retail in a mixed use
scheme in a town centre location.
Harry Platt, Workspace Chief Executive commented,
' We have continued to invest the proceeds from the £42 million disposal of the
portfolio of properties outside the M25, which we completed in January. Our aim
has been to invest in properties in our core market in central London that offer
significant scope for improvement in rental income and a subsequent increase in
capital values. I am confident that these properties which we have added to the
portfolio, will respond well to our style of intensive management.
' We are delighted to have secured outline planning for our development scheme
in Lewisham. This is another example of the group's ability to realise further
value from our property portfolio. We have a number of other schemes in the
pipeline and we expect to accelerate progress on a number of projects during the
year.
' Looking forward, we continue to track a large number of properties in central
London that match our requirements. We are continuing with our strategy of
growing the scale of our portfolio, together with expanding the range of styles
of accommodation that we can offer. In the past few years, we have focused on
creating clusters of properties in areas of London that are particularly
attractive to SMEs. We have a number of sites under offer and I look forward to
updating shareholders on further progress in the near future.'
-ends-
Date: 11 April 2006
For further information contact:
Workspace Group PLC cityPROFILE
Harry Platt, Chief Executive Simon Courtenay
Mark Taylor, Finance Director Andrew Harris
020-7247-7614 020-7448-3244
e-mail: info@workspacegroup.co.uk
web: www.workspacegroup.co.uk
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