London Calling for Tishman Speyer

By Gail Kalinoski, Contributing Editor

Tishman Speyer has added its third central London property in the past year with the acquisition this week of 100 New Oxford St., WC1, a 105,000-square-foot office and retail building.

The U.S.-based developer, owner, operator and manager of properties like Rockefeller Center in New York City acquired the property from a joint venture of Hermes Investment Management and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board. The firms did not say what the purchase price was but several media outlets, including Property Investors Europe, are reporting it was £130 million, or about $205 million.

“The sale of 100 New Oxford St. follows an intensive period of asset management, which has successfully repositioned this building on behalf of our joint venture partners,” Chris Taylor, CEO, Hermes Real Estate, said in a news release. “As a result, we are actively looking to redeploy capital into further significant value-add asset opportunities across the capital.”

The building includes six floors of office space and ground-level retail. It is close to the Centre Point redevelopment project and is surrounded by the Convent Garden, Holborn, Bloomsbury and Soho submarkets. The property is also near the Tottenham Court Road underground station, which will be part of the new $23 billion, 73-mile Crossrail train line expected to be completed in 2018.

When Tishman Speyer agreed to buy the property in December, the building was 50 percent leased and the owners had only renovated four of the six office floors. Since then, the previous owners have completed refurbishing the entire building and all parties worked together to sign two new tenants and the remaining vacant space is under offer. The new tenants are a U.S.-based gourmet burger outlet that will open a new London location and a shipping broker that is leasing office space, according to the news release.

“This is an excellent addition to our London portfolio,” Dan Nicholson, who heads Tishman Speyer’s United Kingdom portfolio, said in the release. “In addition to enjoying a prime location, the recent renovations have made it extremely desirable to potential tenants, as evidenced by the strong leasing activity.”

Keith Williams from Fineman Ross represented Tishman Speyer in the transaction.

It is the third property Tishman Speyer has purchased in London in the past year. In 2014, the firm bought The Point, a 232,800-square-foot office building in the Paddington area of the city for approximately $359 million. Located at 37 N. Wharf Rd., the 11-story building is fully occupied. That purchase came three months after Tishman Speyer picked up 33 Holborn, the 328,000-square-foot corporate headquarters of the grocery company Sainsbury’s.

Elsewhere in Europe,  Tishman Speyer has been active in Frankfurt, Germany, where last week it unveiled a design for a new 45-story, mixed-use tower that will be the first high-rise in Germany to combine work, living and public areas. The firm has already built three office towers in Frankfurt – MesseTurm, OpernTurm and TaunusTurm.