The trustees of a £1.4bn estate that owns a large part of Marylebone have been granted additional powers that are expected to increase its value significantly.
Birss J granted the trustees of the Portman Estate, which has significant property holdings in Central London the “power to trade”, which will enable them to run properties in Gloucester Place, which are currently being refurbished, as hotels from April 2015 onwards.
The power will also cover a 1,000-acre farm in Herefordshire and a mixed residential and commercial redevelopment of an old police station, which is forecast to increase its value from £20m to £60m.
The judge said that the estate, held for the benefit of around 90 members of the Portman family, is worth more than £1.4bn and generated a net profit of more than £18m last year, and that the trustees had been advised that they will be able to significantly increase both the capital value of, and income from, the Gloucester Place hotels if they were able to trade.
Granting a general power to trade, he said that this would be “beneficial” to the estate, and that the evidence shows that the trustees are high calibre individuals who demonstrably would not take a decision to change the direction of the management of the trusts lightly.
He also granted the trustees other powers, including to employ a person to advise on, manage and deal with trust property.
The estate comprises multiple funds, and while one fund already had the power to trade attached, the judge’s ruling now extends that power across all of them.
In the matter of the Portman Estate Chancery (Birss J) 4 March 2015
Georgia Bedworth (instructed by Farrer & Co) for the claimants
