Orchard Street buys Manchester retail park for £63m from The Crown Estate

Orchard Street Investment Management has bought a large retail park in the UK as The Crown Estate looks to recycle some of its assets.

The UK property investment manager has acquired Altrincham Retail Park in Greater Manchester for £63m (€53m).

The Crown Estate, which by law is unable to borrow, said sales are an important part of raising capital for reinvestment.

Geoff Ford, portfolio manager for The Crown Estate’s regional assets, said: “As an actively traded portfolio, sales such as this one play an important role in helping to raise capital for reinvestment across the business, where we continue to deliver brilliant shopping and leisure destinations.”

He added: “Altrincham Retail Park has performed well and helped us to build critical mass within the retail sector.

Orchard Street said the acquisition was made on behalf of St James’s Place Property Unit Trust at a net initial yield of 6.96%.

The retail park comprises 218,764sqft of accommodation across 13 retail warehouse units and two standalone restaurants, in addition to 927 on-site car parking spaces.

The fully-let asset has a weighted-average unexpired lease term (WAULT) of 5.2 years and the total rental income is £4.7m per year, reflecting an average rent of £21.40 per sqft.

Tom Chadwick, associate partner at Orchard Street, said: “We’re pleased to make this yield-accretive acquisition which presents immediate asset management opportunities to improve the WAULT and benefits from the affluent Altrincham catchment.”