£35m fundraise planned to invest in city landmark

A real investment trust has been created to acquire Bridgewater Place and it plans to raise £35m to invest in the 30-storey building.

BWP REIT has been backed by M7 Capital and will be listed on the International Property Securities Exchange (IPSX).

Bridgewater Place was completed in April 2007 and was the tallest building in Leeds city centre until Altus House was completed in the Arena Quarter last year.

BWP said Bridgewater Place, which has 250,000 sq ft of commercial space and nearly 200 apartments, has been independently valued at £63m.

Despite the opening of the southern entrance of Leeds station and the office developments at nearby Sovereign Square, the corporate centre of Leeds has become more concentrated around the Whitehall Road/Wellington Street part of the city centre.

Edmund Craston, chairman of BWP REIT, said the prominent building has historically suffered from a lack of investment.

“Our aim is to execute a programme of works to create a high quality, fully repositioned and energy efficient office space with a strong amenity offer which generates long-term secure income from a range of high-quality tenants,” he said.

“Leeds is one of the UK’s main regional cities and suffers from an acute shortage of high quality modern and sustainable office stock, presenting strong fundamentals to underpin the investment opportunity BWP REIT presents.”

The company has already exchanged contracts for the acquisition of the 30-storey Bridgewater Place building, which is the tallest property in Leeds.

The acquisition will initially be undertaken through the grant of a 999-year lease of the internal commercial areas of the property to M7 BWP Propco Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of the company.

M7 will also be granted a call option to acquire the freehold titles in the future for £1.

Richard Croft, executive chairman of M7, added: “In this case there has been insufficient capital to invest in Bridgewater Place for a number of years, meaning the essential works and cosmetic improvements required to make the property both attractive to office occupiers and investable for yield hungry institutions have not been undertaken.

“This proposed capital raise and admission, will allow us to fully reposition this high-profile property to create a grade A office asset which meets the needs of the modern and future occupier.”