European privately-held real estate investment manager Redevco has agreed to acquire Templars Square in Oxford, UK, for £38.8 mln (€42.5) mln from New River.
Redevco is purchasing the 1960s local shopping centre with a view to transforming it into a residential-led mixed urban scheme over the next decade. The project has a pre-existing planning consent that includes 226 residential units.
Templars Square, which lies 2.5 miles (4 kms) south-east of Oxford’s city centre, is a covered mall-based shopping centre with some open-air and street-facing retail units, two car parks (Knights and Barns Road) and upper-floor offices. The 3.65-hectare site is broadly located between Cowley’s Towns Road to the north and Hockmore Street to the south. The asset is part freehold, with the majority owned as long-leasehold for a period of close to 200 years.
Tom Hoye, transaction director at Redevco UK said: ‘Templars Square offers an outstanding opportunity for Redevco to do what it does best, namely helping cities become more sustainable and liveable places. We plan to take a much-loved, but dated, retail asset and transform it into a thriving urban destination which will continue to draw in the local community.’
