£4m in 1000days

IRISH investors have swooped again. A Deansgate office block has been sold to Irish-based investors, earning Nabeel Chowdery’s Property Route £4m profit.

Altrincham based Property Route, run by Nabeel Musserat Chowdery, has sold its freehold interest in Lancaster Buildings on Deansgate to private clients for £12.7m.

They bought the block from G Capital in August, 2004, paying £8.7m – making a profit of £4m for 1,000 days of ownership. The deal comes a week after it emerged that a Mosley Street office block has changed hands, earning a cool £20m profit for the owners, after another deal with Irish investors. Anglo-Irish Bank and its partners sold the new 114,000 sq ft Cobbetts law firm building at 56-58 Mosley Street, to Bank of Ireland Asset Management for £65m.

Manchester is now seeing some of the fastest commercial property price rises in the UK, with investors earning record returns. Strong interest from Irish investors, who now dominate the city’s property business, is said to be behind the phenomenal growth in property values.

The two deals together show that commercial office buildings in Manchester are growing in value at an average rate of 19p a day for every square foot of floorspace.

Location

Lancaster Buildings, which was first acquired in a private off-market deal in 2004, includes six shops and 15,000 sq ft of offices. Retail tenants include a Subway sandwich bar and Caffe Nero. The property is in a location guaranteed to appeal to investors, between Harvey Nichols and House of Fraser.

Two of the three floors of offices are currently vacant and will be refurbished. The deal is due to complete in May.

The building has been sold to Morgan Leahy Property Investment Group, owners of the neighbouring Grade II* listed Barton Arcade. Limerick-based investor Morgan Leahy bought the Arcade in January.

David Pelham, director at Property Route, explained: “The purchaser made a very credible offer and we recognised that they had the ability to match our expectations on value.”

Chris Jones, partner at specialist Manchester-based property investment consultancy Christopher Dee, who advised the buyers, said: “Following our acquisition of the Barton Arcade next door, we saw a number of advantages of owning both assets, which now have a combined value in excess of £30m.”

This article was originally published on Manchester Evening News.