Friday, July 13, 2012

Tenant broadcasters

The Times believes that the BBC has finally decided on developers Stanhope as its preferred bidder for the 14-acre Television Centre site in W12 - Auntie's last big freehold. And it estimates the price as £200m. That's a good deal more than the £30m I miserably estimated, but south of the £300m some spinners were suggesting along the year-long process.

Stanhope, who first came to prominence as under Stuart Lipton as co-developers of Broadgate, around Liverpool Street Station, in the late 1980s, have fingers in some strong current projects - Chiswick Park, Central St Giles, and BSkyB's new hq in Osterley. And they've just won preferred status for a sensitive site in Salisbury.  Ironically one of their contenders for Television Centre was Chelsfield, under the-now-Sir Stuart Lipton.

Stanhope's partners include Mitsui Fudosan, one of Japan's largest property companies. I have yet to track down the Mexican element of the deal, but feel sure it's in there somewhere.

Is TV Centre worth £200m? At £14.2m an acre, it's less than smaller sites nearby are asking - one development plot next to Westfield wants the equivalent of £32.5m per acre. The BBC will argue it's not really about the cash price - it's about avoiding the costs of maintenance on a site that's way past its best. And the developer has their hands tied by odd parcels of the site that are listed, making their work trickier. Nonetheless, if they can get, say 400 two-bed flats in, at £500,000 each, then the rest is profit. With some 1.5m square foot of development space, they could in theory go for 10,000 two bed flats, if Hammersmith let them.

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