Leeds and inward investment key to Northern Powerhouse goals says property specialist
“LEEDS needs to be the focus of the region” says David Aspland head of commercial at Carter Jonas, as he took to the stage for the estate agency’s insights event into the property market for 2016.
Team members including head of research Darren Yates, from Carter Jonas’ Yorkshire offices discussed the outlook for the property sector across industrial, office and retail in an event at Aspire earlier this month.
Mr Aspland said: “My key point is that we talk about the Northern Powerhouse and these things, I strongly believe that Leeds needs to be a focus of the region.
“If you have a lot of places competing for the same pot, you have a lot of disparate parts that might not add up to the main – if you focus on one thing and do it well, this will trickle out to the rest of the region, Mr Aspland said.
He focused on infrastructure such as Leeds Station as a “real weakness” in the Leeds property offering.
“You see Trinity and Victoria Gate, and in comparison the station is over congested, it looks tatty and old. The Southern entrance is fantastic, but we need more of it,” he said.
It was easy for organisations like Network Rail to be complacent, due to the timeline for a project like HS2, similarly Leeds Bradford Airport has its own struggles.
Mr Aspland continued: “It it was a choice between Leeds or Manchester in terms of aviation, people would go straight to Manchester. These are the macro problems we have if we want to compete on a national and international level.
Areas in which Carter Jonas operated include York and Harrogate, and Mr Aspland said those were the real potential areas for growth in North Yorkshire.
“People may begin to slow down investment in London because it is overheated. London has reached its peak which is good for the regions – global money is now looking for opportunities elsewhere.”
However, he said, whilst councils in South Yorkshire are on the ball with encouraging new business and inward investment, the councils in North Yorkshire “want to maintain status quo” and aren’t necessarily concerned in the same way about job creation.
“The market demand is here,” Mr Aspland said, “but there is no one desperate to deliver it.”
He said that residential units have a higher value in places like York and Harrogate, and as a result potential employment sites can be lost.
Confidence is still there, however, in Yorkshire and across the UK.
He said: “I’m cautiously optimistic. There are a lot of things happening in the world, from a potential Brexit, to China’s disappointing market performance, to Donald Trump in the US. These things give investors and others an excuse not to do anything.”
Investors wait until the storm has blown over before making any concrete plans, according to Mr Aspland, and this is why the Carter Jonas specialists predicted a slight slowdown in the market this year.
Mr Aspland said: “Funding is getting better and property is getting better, having been bottom of the pile and blamed for the collapse of economy, property is now seen as a good investment medium again and we need to capitalise on that.”
