MORNING NEWS: Top agencies of Q2 revealed

Good morning. Here’s your daily round-up of the latest news and views from EG and a collection of real estate-relevant headlines from the national papers. Cushman & Wakefield sits at the top of the EG Radius office leaderboards in the second quarter, after a strong performance across London submarkets helped it it transact almost 1.2m sq ft in the capital. Based on transactional data shared by members of the EG Radius community, the leaderboards cover all occupier sales and lettings but exclude lease renewals. Find out where your firm ended the quarter here. A £483m impairment on Hammerson’s Value Retail business, which it sold its stake in earlier this week, pushed the REIT firmly back into the red in today’s half-year results. The REIT reported an IFRS loss of £517m, compared with just £1.2m of losses in the same period in 2023. Chief executive Rita-Rose Gagné said: “We are realising the benefits of our investments in recent years and with the agreed disposal of Value Retail, we now have the capacity and capability to accelerate growth and value creation.” Speaking with EG earlier in the week, Gagné said: “We scaled back, but we are scaling back up. The notion was never to make the company smaller, it was to make the company larger and stronger. We just had to go down this path to then grow it back in the right way.” Primary Health Properties is aiming to grow its portfolio exposure in Ireland to around 15% in the near-term as its future development pipeline in the UK is held back by slow rental moves and high costs. Chief executive Mark Davies said: “We have established a strong footing there. We were an early mover about 10 years ago and we were able to buy well with limited competition. “We would like to increase our weighting in Ireland and to do that we will rely on our team. We have 30 people on the ground, their eyes and ears we think are the best in the market, and we have a great technical capability out there as well.” There’s also news on new retail deals for GPE, the next life sciences campus from UBS and Reef, and a call for the government to show “coherence, clarity and consistency” on housing policy. All of the news from EG, plus a selection of headlines from the nationals:Deal numbers up as EG Radius reveals most successful agents of Q2Disposals hit earnings as Hammerson rebalancesUBS Reef jv gets nod for £360m Cambridge life science hubGPE signs retail trio for Oxford Street schemeOldham development framework unveiledAEW posts return to NAV growthPHP eyes Irish expansion as UK development slowsDandara plans 399-bed Bristol PBSA schemeIs it time for real estate to be more terrier?Why Northstowe could be the new model townPi Labs names fourth partnerBury Council approves £100m Prestwich overhaulBarker: UK housing policy needs ‘coherence, clarity and consistency’MRP proposes 750-home scheme for BristolCabot to boost industrial offering in Golden TriangleEvolve Estates takes shopping centre to full occupancyOxford Trust lodges plans for new lab facility at Wood CentreHomes England adds PJ Livesey to its delivery partner networkUnite buys £200m PBSA in SouthwarkPlanners approve Sheffield’s former Cannon Brewery revampHines raises €1bn for European fundDar secures $275m for international expansionBank of England to cut interest rates in August, economists forecastTaxpayers must spend more on NHS health centres, says property developer (£)Higher mortgage rates have pushed 320,000 borrowers into poverty (£)Demolition is the only course fit for London’s redundant skyscrapers (£)