Good morning. Here is your AM bulletin with the latest news and views from EG, as well as a few good yarns from the morning papers.
Scotland is the most in-demand part of the UK for offices, according to EG’s Propertylink and Rightmove. It was the only part of the UK where demand was up both on pre-Covid levels and up year-on-year.
The Times (£) and The Telegraph (£) pick up on the data to point out that demand for office space across the UK remains higher than before the pandemic, while demand in London has slumped. (But that’ll be old news to avid EG readers!)
Meanwhile, Cain International and Starwood Capital are putting £535m into phase three of Wood Wharf, the residential-led expansion of the Canary Wharf estate.
The development is seen as the future of the financial district, which is just as well, as vacancy rates for the rest of the estate have reached an 18-year high of 14.8%.
Blackstone has moved from being one of the most acquisitive players in the market to a net seller, as it builds up a warchest for its $8bn data centre spree.
And interest rates are set to rise to a fresh 15-year high when rate-setters meet later this week. But will it be 5.25% or 5.5%?
The financial cost of the Grenfell Tower disaster has soared to £1.2bn.
And HS2 is “unachievable”, according to the Infrastructure and Projects Authority watchdog.
The number of new homes built this quarter has plunged, according to government data.
Meanwhile, shadow levelling up secretary Lisa Nandy tells The Times (£) why she has embraced the right to buy.
Monaco is living up to its reputation as a “sunny place for shady people” as a property corruption scandal claims the scalp of the principality’s asset manager.
And The Times (£) has more details on property billionaire Joe Lewis and the allegations of his “brazen” insider trading.
And finally, Elon Musk has blamed his landlord for his failure to ditch the bird and install his X. The Twitter owner has attempted to remove the blue bird logo from his San Francisco HQ, Market Square, after hoisting a flashing X logo onto the roof, much to the irritation of his neighbours. But Musk has blamed attempts to stop him from doing this on his landlord, Shorenstein, tweeting a clown emoji and “a mocking post”. Seeing as Shorenstein has already had to sue Twitter for non payment of rent, and had financial issues as a result, maybe it is time Musk became its X tenant?
