British Land to spend
BRITISH LAND is to spend up to £1billion on new property after yesterday selling half its stake in City of London office complex Broadgate.
The commercial property developer and landlord sold the stake to US property giant Blackstone for £77million in cash. But the deal will also allow British Land to offload £987million of debt into the joint venture being set up to run Broadgate by the two firms.
Chief executive Chris Grigg said the group now had £2billion in firepower, but was “aiming to spend £1billion” in the next year to two years. “We think there are some really good opportunities out there, given the current state of the market,” he said. “The deal gives us significant firepower. We’ll be patient – we’re not going to go out there and buy things for the sake of it – but the market is a lot more attractive than it was three months ago.”
The long-awaited deal reduces the group’s loan-to-value ratio to just 30 per cent. Grigg has been reducing the group’s exposure to large, single assets such as Broadgate since joining British Land in January.
Broadgate has lost 40 per cent of its value since its peak two years ago.