British Land Plans £100 Million London Office Development

With the commercial property market seeing a welcome recovery, British Land are planning to kick start a £100 million development in central London.

Not content with merely speculative plans, 2-14 Baker Street has been snapped up by the property investment company from McAleer & Rushe for £29 million as the base for redevelopment.

The 139,000 sq ft offices on Portman Square, just north of the shopping haven of central London’s Oxford Street will offer a prime location for an expansive office project. Approximately 93,000 sq ft is offered by the existing W1 offices and is mostly vacant.

As part of the sale terms McAleer & Rushe will enter into a joint agreement with British Land wherein the new buyer will be the development manager while the sellers will act as contractor for the project. McAleer & Rushe will also take a slice of the profits when the development begins to take tenants.

Eamonn Laverty of the McAleer & Rushe group was pleased to announce the partnership, saying, “By working with British Land we have brought together a wealth of London office development and construction experience which we believe will produce one of the best office buildings in the coming market, whilst also achieving a development funding solution in this difficult economic climate.”

Property analysts have already estimated a 15 percent profit margin on the development.

Tim Roberts, Head of Offices said of the deal, “This is a great opportunity for British Land to buy into one of the limited number of prime central London locations with planning consent at an early stage in the recovery cycle.We are optimistic about the outlook for rental growth in the West Endoffice market and expect to generate strong returns as we leverage our development expertise.”