by Alex Catalano
Japanese trading company C Itoh have sold 24 Lombard Street, EC4 (shown here) — the building they acquired only five months ago — to one of Japan’s big contractors, Takenaka.
The deal, said to involve some £70m, was agreed in Tokyo between the two companies, and the likelihood is that Takenaka will be selling the property on to a Japanese financial occupier.
The word from Tokyo is that this will be one of the second-order Japanese securities houses. But one possibility is the Long Term Credit Bank of Japan, who are currently in Phoenix House on King William Street, EC1, where Takenaka are also housed. Their securities operation LTCB International are also there.
C Itoh originally bought the property in partnership with an Australian developer, Land Equity Group, with the apparent aim of redeveloping the building. The vendors were the Royal Bank of Scotland, who were advised by St Quintin. Jones Lang Wootton and Drivers Jonas acted for the C Itoh/Land Equity partnership, who paid around £60m, rather than the £55m originally stated.
The building was refurbished about two years ago, and the £70m re-sale has raised some eyebrows in the City. “There is no way you can justify redevelopment unless you use fancy figures,” says one agent, before coming to the inevitable conclusion: “The Japanese do figures in a different way.” The site could possibly take 100,000 sq ft of offices if redeveloped.
Takenaka, one of Japan’s “Big Six” construction companies, had a turnover of £3.6bn in 1986, with 3% of it coming from overseas. In the United States, they are involved in a hotel project in Los Angeles with Dai Ichi Mutual Life Insurance and Japan Air Lines.
Closer to their home, the company are teamed up with C Itoh, the Long Term Credit Bank of Japan and Tokyo Land to develop a large-scale industrial park in the Tsukuba “Academic City”.
