Allsop Commercial’s March auction saw a swing towards £1m-plus lots with UK investors outbidding overseas buyers.
Of the £78m raised across 130 lots offered, £44.6m came from just 20 lots above £1m.
All of these lots were sold to UK buyers, although underbidders included Middle Eastern and Far Eastern money.
Prior to the auction, Carlton House in Putney, SW15, was sold for £13.5m off a guide of £7m by a Tunbridge Wells-based property firm to Marc Pennick’s Fifth Capital London. It was the largest lot ever sold ?on an auction contract.
Auctioneer George Walker said: “The fascination is continuing with London and the South East. There is a lot of appetite from retail investors, who want to get their cash invested.”
Overall, an 82% success rate was achieved with 106 lots selling – 14 prior – out of 130 offered. Although the rate was lower than the 85% achieved at Allsop Commercial’s February sale and the 87.5% 2013 average, the total raised was the third-highest since October 2012.
A package of freeholds in Hampstead, NW3, also sold to separate buyers, with two restaurant and maisonette properties sold for £1.1m and £3m, a Pizza Express for £1.7m, and an estate agent for £880,000.
The largest lot under the hammer was the Trident Centre, a multilet shopping centre in Dudley, West Midlands, which sold for £3.3m to a local property company. The property was guided at £2.5m-£2.8m on behalf of receivers. Overall, grade-A retail yields tightened from 6.3% in 2013 to 5.4%.
The sale also saw a 3.7% yield achieved on a Barclays bank in Twickenham, with a UK purchaser trumping Chinese bidders with a £2.7m offer.
