British Land has exchanged contracts for the sale of its 50% stake in Meadowhall Shopping Centre to its partner Norges Bank Investment Management for £360 mln (€420 mln).
This follows the sale of some ancillary land by the joint venture for £7 mln (representing British Land's share) earlier this year. Together these deals value the entirety of the Meadowhall Estate at £734 mln, 3% above the September 2023 book value.
Simon Carter, chief executive of British Land, said: 'We have had a successful partnership with Norges over many years and are delighted to continue to work alongside them as asset managers of the centre.
'Following the sale of Meadowhall, 93% of our portfolio is now in our preferred segments of retail parks, campuses and London urban logistics.
'We will continue to grow our retail park portfolio; with low capex requirements parks offer attractive cash returns and at 99% occupancy we are delivering strong rental growth.'
As part of the transaction, British Land will remain as asset manager of Meadowhall shopping centre, for which it will continue to earn fees in line with current terms.
The transaction is expected to complete in July 2024 and the proceeds will be used for general corporate purposes including reinvestment into retail parks.
Proceeds after net debt of around £200 mln are expected to total £156 mln. The transaction is set to reduce proportionally consolidated LTV for the first half of 2024 by 2.7ppt.
