£1.48m deal will lead to combined residential and commercial scheme
A Nottingham-based investment company has acquired a 117,000 sq ft site in the heart of Birkenhead for £1.48m, with the aim of creating 70 flats and a range of commercial units.
Gape Equity, a subsidiary of ALB Investments, which has become well known for its regeneration of urban buildings in and around the Midlands, has bought the huge town centre building with a view to creating fresh commercial and residential options at the centre of the town.
The building currently comprises six ground floor shop units, with existing tenants including New Look, Barclays Bank and TK Maxx.
The first and second floors, meanwhile, are currently vacant office space.
The provisional plan is to bring new commercial tenants into the three remaining shop units on the ground floor, while redeveloping the first and second floors to create around 70 high-spec one- and two-bedroom residential flats.
Having carried out exactly this kind of project before, managing director Arran Bailey is comfortable with the undertaking: “We’re well accustomed to the development of dual-purpose buildings, with residential flats on the upper floors and commercial operations at street level – so this new acquisition in Birkenhead dovetails very nicely with our key area of expertise.”
Arran believes that the building’s location, on a pedestrianised corner of St John Street and Grange Road, adjacent to Birkenhead’s Pyramids Shopping Centre, is also a plus: “As the Wirral’s primary town, just a stone’s from Liverpool, Birkenhead has a lot going for it.
“It has all the transport links you could want, allied to lots of footfall for local businesses and plenty of appeal as a place to live.”
As with similar projects overseen by Arran in the Nottingham and Derby area, the Birkenhead property will enable Gape Equity to supplement footfall on the local High Street, while creating desirable places of residence for people who want to live at the heart of the town.
