PRUPIM has emerged as the frontrunner to buy a £100m portfolio of super fire centres, formerly controlled by Evans Randall.
The UK fund manager is the preferred bidder for the Steel Portfolio of vacant fire centres, built as part of ex-deputy prime minister Lord Prescott’s botched £450m FiReControl scheme.
They were developed by Evans Randall vehicle The Control Centre General Partner Limited, which was put into administration in April by Lloyds Banking Group. PwC and Jones Lang LaSalle were appointed to handle the sale.
A source said: “The super fire stations were always likely to appeal to a UK fund because of the guaranteed government rent and the capital allowances available on the £71m spent building them.”
Despite their vacancy, the buildings, each 30,000 sq ft, generate an income of more than £7m pa on 25-year leases.
They are at Wolverhampton Business Park, Paragon Business Village in Wakefield, Durham’s Belmont Business Park, Willow Farm Business Park in Castle Donington and at Cambridge Research Park.
Labour commissioned the construction of nine high-spec regional fire stations in 2004 to replace 46 local control rooms but the scheme was scrapped in 2010 with only five centres completed.
The National Audit Office dubbed it “one of the worst ever wastes of public money”.
