Criterion Capital has put a 370,000 sq ft shopping centre in south London up for sale as it moves to increase its holdings in London’s Leicester Square.
The firm, led by Asif Aziz, has decided to sell the St Nicholas Centre in Sutton after receivers at Allsop brought the site of the Odeon West End cinema in Leicester Square, WC2, to market last week (30 April, p29).
Criterion, through agent HP Four, is seeking around £90m for the mall – a 6.5% yield.
The shopping centre is anchored by a 155,000 sq ft Debenhams and is let off a low average zone A rent of £40 per sq ft. More than 50% of the income is held on leases with unexpired terms of more than five years, with 27% on leases with unexpired terms of 10 years.
Mark Nash, co-founder of letting agent Nash Bond, said the shopping centre offered numerous asset management opportunities to further improve the tenant mix and income. Plans had been drawn up to develop a 100-bedroom hotel and residential tower on the site.
Criterion paid GE Capital £78m for the St Nicholas Centre in November 2004, but has since bought adjoining sites to extend the mall.
The firm has been selling assets outside its core focus of central London since winning the battle to buy the 500,000 sq ft Trocadero centre on Leicester Square in 2005. Since then Criterion has been adding to its holdings in the West End and now manages more than 2m sq ft of property in the Piccadilly Circus-Leicester Square corridor.
It is one of a number of central London investors vying to buy the Odeon West End, where plans exist for a £200m Make-designed, mixed-use scheme.
