A steady start to 2022 for Irelands Commercial Property Market despite the geopolitical backdrop posting a Q1 turnover of €759.4m beating both the Q1 2019 and Q1 2020 figures.
Agent Bannon is guiding a price of €1.9 million for a community retail investment opportunity comprising four retail units and a standalone creche at Adamstown in west Dublin.
The units, which are below a modern residential development called the Sentinel Building, are occupied by Londis (with a guarantee from parent company BWG), Mizzoni’s Pizza and Pamper Yourself, together with one small vacant unit. The creche is operated by Giraffe Childcare. All of the units are presented in excellent condition throughout and benefit from prominent road frontage.
The annual passing rent is currently €163,375 with substantial reversionary potential. The asking price offers the prospective purchaser an attractive initial yield of 7.84 per cent, rising to a potential double-digit yield on the letting of the vacant unit and the settlement of the outstanding Londis and creche rent reviews. The properties extend to a total floor area of 15,264sq ft and have a weighted average unexpired lease term (Wault) to break of 6.43 years and a Wault to lease expiry of 8.72 years.
The subject units are in the southeast of Adamstown and 750m from Adamstown train station. The surrounding area is predominantly in residential use with a mix of high- and low-density housing. Current population estimates suggest a resident population of about 5,000 and once fully complete this is projected to be 25,000 people.
Ros Tierney of Bannon expects to see “significant interest from investors seeking a high-profile grocery and necessity portfolio with value-add potential through asset management”.
Pan European investor and asset manager M7 Real Estate has paid just under €15 million for two office blocks in south Dublin.
Developed in the late 1980s as part of the wider Merrion Shopping Centre scheme, the Nutley and AIG buildings comprise an overall floor area of 4,016sq m (43,235sq ft) along with 83 undercroft car parking spaces. The subject property is currently generating total rental income of €1,439,932 a year.
The Nutley Building is let to a number of occupiers including Bonkers Money, the Japanese Embassy, the Austrian Embassy and Global Standards while the AIG Building is let to a single tenant with a number of sub leases in place.
While The Irish Times reported that the deal for the two offices was close to being finalised in October 2020, it is understood the proposed transaction was completed only in recent weeks. Commercial real estate consultants Bannon handled the sale.
Following its latest purchase, M7’s Irish portfolio now comprises 18 assets extending to just under 1,100,000sq ft, primarily in industrial and logistics space.
In October 2020, the company paid about €13.5 million for the long leasehold interest of five fully let units at the Sandyford Business Centre in south Dublin.
The purchase of the portfolio gave it control of five of the scheme’s 10 units along with an associated provision of 200 car parking spaces. The portfolio’s office accommodation covers a combined area of 4,532sq m (48,786sq ft) and is producing annual rental income of €1,192,578 with a weighted average unexpired lease term of 5.8 years, with breaks at 4.6 years.
In August 2020, the company paid €6.25 million for the former Kildare headquarter office and distribution facility of convenience store operator ADM Londis, while in January 2020 it acquired the Primeside Park industrial estate in Dublin for €6.75 million.
The group also controls the Century Business Park in Finglas, which it acquired for €4.47 million in September 2019, and the Westlink industrial estate in Dublin 10, which it bought for €13,870,000 in 2018.
Its first investment here came in 2017 when it bought Fumbally Lane, a combined office and residential development in Dublin 8 which was on the market for €24 million. M7 sold Fumbally Lane to BCP Asset Management in 2018 for €33.5 million, following the completion of a comprehensive asset management programme which enabled the property’s vacancy rate to plummet from 17 per cent to 2 per cent through the addition of 19 new tenants, and its annual rental income grow by €1.14 million.
M7 operates across 14 countries. It manages a portfolio of about 835 retail, office and industrial assets with a value of about €5.1 billion.
The Bannon snapshot shows an exceptional year for PRS with almost 42% of turnover (despite a weak Q4) and the wider market as a whole showing the second-highest annual turnover on record. 2022 likely to see the resurgence of retail and consolidation of sheds!
Some of the Bannon team inspecting Fitzwilliam 28 this week which is nearing PC. The new ESB Headquarters raises the bar for sustainable office development in Ireland. Proud to have been part of the team to bring this exciting development to fruition since 2011.
Called The Crossings, Quintain’s first phase of development at the new urban centre in Adamstown will include 279 apartments and more than 91,000sq ft/8,500sq m of space to house two major supermarkets, 20 retail units and five restaurant outlets, along with a multi-storey car park.
Quintain is the housebuilding unit of US private equity giant Lone Star, which has accumulated a massive Irish landbank.
Construction of the apartments has a completion date of mid-2023. Planning permission for a second phase of 185 apartments has been granted and further phases are planned for submission in late 2021 and early 2022.
Quintain has a buyer lined up for the first tranche of its buy-to-rent scheme but Eddie Byrne, joint managing partner with the developer, says “it’s too early to say who it is”.
Getting this forward funding is key to the construction of such a developments, he says. “You really need to be able to have a buyer lined up in advance.” The Crossings will form an integral part of a new urban centre at Adamstown, which, over the next four to five years, will see the construction by Quintain of almost 1,000 residential units, mostly apartments/duplexes, with a “very small number of houses”.
On the retail side, Tesco has signed a lease for a 40,000sq ft/3,700sq m store, which is set to open in January 2023, with a second leading supermarket anchor store set to open a
Bannon has been retained as agents for the leasing of the retail units, which will serve an estimated potential shopping population of more than 100,000 people drawn from Adamstown, and the neighbouring suburbs of Lucan, Celbridge and Leixlip.t the same time.
To date, Quintain and its affiliates have built 1,000 homes in Adamstown, with over 85 per cent occupied by first-time buyers, launching developments such as Tandy’s Lane and Somerton.
Earlier this year it received planning permission to construct 235 new homes at Aderrig in Adamstown, to include 159 houses and 76 apartments. The scale of its total investment in the area is expected to be north of about €3 billion.
In June, Quintain completed and transferred ownership to South Dublin County Council of Tandy’s Lane Park, which will provide local residents with easy access to green open space. Another 27-acre green open space – Airlie Park – is set to open by the end of the year and will include a cricket pitch and Astroturf pitches, while a two-acre village green will provide a centre piece for The Crossings development.
Michael Hynes, joint managing partner with Quintain Ireland, said, “This investment will contribute to the social fabric of the area, and is supported by the handover of Tandy’s Lane Park to South Dublin County Council. We are very confident in the strong level of demand there is to live in the area, which will be boosted by the new amenities we are delivering.”
Quintain owns 220 acres in the Adamstown/Lucan area, where it plans to develop up to 5,000 new homes and 250,000sq ft of commercial space. The company’s broader land portfolio covers 460 acres of prime assets in Ireland at Adamstown, Clonburris, Portmarnock, and Cherrywood.
Adamstown was launched in 2005 as Ireland’s first new planned town since Shannon, Co Clare, in the 1960s.
The Bannon Capital Markets snapshot highlights that the Retail Sector has finally emerged from the shadows at 14% of Q3 turnover of €794m …..but PRS remains the dominant player @ 50%. While Q3 was always going to struggle to match the pent up demand that emerged in Q2 @ €1.5bn, the outlook remains very strong. There is approx. €1.3bn on the market or at agreed stage which leaves our projection of €4.5bn for 2021 intact, an annual out-turn that will only have been surpassed once (in 2019)!
Five Lamps Spar store guiding at €900,000.
Ros Tierney of Bannon says: “We expect to see significant interest from pension investors. This is a high-profile, resilient property with a tenant who has performed strongly throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. The investment offers the purchaser an attractive yield and a long lease term.”
Despite the backdrop, another very strong quarter in the Capital Markets with the private rented residential sector leading the charge as usual. Based on pipeline supply 2021 turnover looks set to be the 2nd strongest year of all time! See Bannon quarterly snapshot.
International real estate firm Hines has formally acquired the second phase of Chatham & King, a new high-profile mixed-use scheme next to the Gaiety Theatre on South King Street in Dublin city centre.
Hines’s acquisition of the 3,950sq m (42,500sq ft) portfolio marks the culmination of the €165 million deal it agreed with US private equity giant Lone Star for the wider Chatham & King development in 2018. In acquiring the scheme, Hines fended off three rival bids. Two of the competing offers came from German funds, while the third bid came from the billionaire founder of the Zara fashion chain, Amancio Ortega.
In securing ownership of the development, Hines gained immediate control of a mixed-use building with retail units comprising 3,112sq m (33,500sq ft) occupied by Zara, H&M and Warehouse, along with 2,879sq m (31,000sq ft) of overhead office space occupied by data analytics management firm Qualtrics as its European headquarters.
The second phase, which has now been completed by Lone Star, comprises six residential units, five retail units totalling 1,486sq m (16,000sq ft) and 2,461sq m (26,500sq ft) of office space which will be occupied by Qualtrics. The €40 million cost of developing the new building on Chatham Street and Clarendon Row was included as part of the €165 million deal agreed on behalf of Hines European Core Fund (HECF) in 2018.
Hines says that negotiations are at an advanced stage on each of the five new retail units, which range in size from 46sq m (495sq ft) to 1,178sq m (12,680sq ft). The incoming tenants will sit alongside the existing tenants, which include Zara, H&M and Apple-reseller CompuB, which recently signed a new lease for a 315sq m (3,400sq ft) retail unit on South King Street.
The Chatham & King scheme has a prime location next to Grafton Street and St Stephen’s Green, and sits within close proximity to the Westbury Hotel and the new Dublin headquarters of the European Parliament, which is scheduled for completion in November 2023.
Simone Pozzato, managing director and deputy HECF fund manager at Hines, said: “The acquisition of phase two of Chatham & King completes the final element of this portfolio and marks the delivery of an LEED-accredited asset in the Dublin office and retail sector at an opportune time. The property is an excellent fit for HECF given its central location in Dublin, a city which continues to show strong economic growth.
“We are already encouraged by the promising engagements to date from some very exciting retail brands who would be ideally suited to this prestigious shopping district. We hope to have further announcements in this regard in the near future.”
Peter Lynn, director with Hines Ireland, added: “We are delighted to make this timely announcement as Dublin city centre continues to reopen and as Chatham Street itself has recently undergone a significant transformation with Dublin City Council’s pedestrianisation programme. Chatham & King is a high-quality addition to this historic street and our new retail spaces will represent a significant enhancement to the city’s most fashionable shopping district. We are also equally excited to be working with Qualtrics as our lead office occupier as they continue on their growth story.”
