Retail REIT NewRiver confident as Regent Court grows in popularity
RETAIL REIT NewRiver, which owns several shopping centres in the West Midlands, has continued to strengthen its portfolio during the past quarter with a number of new lease agreements.
The firm, which owns centres in Erdington and Leamington Spa, said that during the period July 1 to September 30 it had increased the number of leases in its site portfolio from 947 to 955. It also completed 23 new leasing events generating a total rental income of £946,000 pa, approximately 10.4% above estimated rental value.
The period also saw rent roll under management increase by 2.8% to £42.358m and the average new lease agreement increased to 11.3 years. There has also been a 1% improvement to occupancy rates from 94% to 95%.
One of the sites owned by the firm is Regent Court in Leamington Spa. It is striving to re-position the centre as a restaurant and leisure destination and it said progress on this was good.
The company has secured planning consent for the centre to be the principal restaurant and leisure destination in the town and it said it believed it would benefit from increasing operator demand in the next phase of letting opportunities.
A new 15-year lease has been agreed with national restaurant operator Turtle Bay at a rent of £107,000 pa. Construction work on its new outlet will begin imminently, with Turtle Bay expected to take possession in mid-November.
A number of other national restaurant operators are also in advanced legal negotiations to occupy space within the centre. These include Nandos, Wagamama, Strada and Prezzo.
Alongside the letting to Turtle Bay, NewRiver said the void rate for the centre had reduced from 13.5% at the time of purchase in December 2012 to 4%; a point which it said illustrated its effective asset management strategy.
The firm said it continued to grow and enhance its commercialisation revenue across its portfolio with net income of £250,000 in Q1 exceeding management forecast by 38%. It said it was also confident of further growth in Q2 and for the remainder of the financial year.
Allan Lockhart, Property Director at NewRiver Retail, said: “We have continued to build on the strong start to the financial year and achieved significant progress on a number of initiatives across the portfolio. Importantly NewRiver has agreed a number of new lease agreements which now total 50 lettings and renewals since April 2013, leading to increased occupancy across our centres.”
NewRiver Retail is the UK’s fourth largest shopping centre owner by number with assets under management of £440m – comprising 24 shopping centres, 16 high street retail units and two supermarkets. The portfolio has in excess of 950 occupiers, a total of 3.8m sq ft and total annual footfall of over 95m.
