Signature Living signs up to £200m development across Liverpool

THE owner of Liverpool’s largest provider of hotel and apartments for visitors is planning a massive expansion across the city region in 2016.

Lawrence Kenwright is aiming to grow Signature Living’s footprint from the city centre into the surrounding boroughs by a million square feet in 2016, yielding a gross development value of £200m.

In addition to the recently developed 100-room Shankly Hotel, there is also 30 James Street, which has 80 bedrooms and there are five other key smaller developments in the city.

Kenwright, the son of Everton chairman Bill Kenwright’s cousin, says the forthcoming new development is being fuelled by investment from the Far East.

“They don’t want to leave their money in their banks,” said Kenwright. “The UK is seen as an investment safe haven. But the London property market has overheated, which prompted a lot of investment into Manchester.

“Now, Manchester is also overheating, so Liverpool is seen as a bargain.”
Kenwright said he sees Liverpool as a similar city to Newcastle, but it has more listed buildings than any other major UK city, which is good news for his business.

“It’s great for us, because we love restoring old buildings,” he said. “A lot of developers don’t like restoring old buildings.

“The listed buildings situation is the reason why Liverpool still has dereliction on some of its main streets.”

Signature Living’s launch and  expansion has come in the face of the worst depressions in living memory, after Kenwright lost much of his property portfolio in 2007.

“I started Signature Living with just one apartment in 2008,” he continued. “We grew it to 1,240 beds to become Liverpool’s larges accommodation provider.

“We expanded during the recession event though there were no bank funds available. Four years ago we had 2,400 beds in the city and we now have 7,500.

“We’ve also got hotels churning out 97%  occupancy levels, which is some feat during times of adversity.”

Kenwright said three sites out of the city had been agreed with negotiations taking place for more.