Oakgate confident about York following deals

A GRADE-two listed building and car park in York have been sold for a total of £12.6m.

The building, on the junction of Stonegate and High Petergate, has been bought for £1.5m by the London-based St Olave's Pension Fund from property development and investment companies The Oakgate Group.

Wetherby-based Oakgate bought the freehold of the building, which houses jewellers Links of London, for £1m last year and has since refurbished it. It was previously occupied by hardware specialists Woollens and Harwood.

John Grantham, chief executive of Oakgate, said: “This sale confirms that York remains an extremely attractive city for retail investors. The doom and gloom merchants would have us believe that commercial property is in freefall, but there are deals to be done, provided the product and the price are right.

Meanwhile, Oakgate has sold the Tanner Row car park development in York to the Nationwide Building Society Investment Fund for £11.1m.

Mr Grantham said: “When we bought Tanner Row six years ago, it was one of York's biggest eyesores. We are proud that we have transformed this ugly duckling into a much more presentable swan and made the award-winning car park itself much more user-friendly and secure.

“The city remains an extremely attractive proposition for would-be investors, with its wealth of history, its superb transport links and its quality of life.”