Top 10 Most Expensive Office Markets
December 1, 2009
CBRE has put out a report on global office rents. Not surprisingly, rents are falling in almost every major market, with significant cuts in some of the markets that had skyrocketed the most (e.g. Russia). The top 10 most expensive office markets are below. Rents are in USD/SF/Year. London (West End) – $185 psf Tokyo [...]
Read More >>Apple To Open 40 to 50 New Stores – More Than Half Internationally
November 17, 2009
Cupertino’s Apple Computer (AAPL: 252.17 +0.74%) announced that it intends on opening 40-50 new stores next year. More than half of them will be international. It also intends to open up some as more significant flagship stores in prominent locations in London, Shanghai, and Paris. It also recently just opened a new store in Manhattan. [...]
Read More >>Downturn Presents Once (or Twice) In A Lifetime Opportunities
September 29, 2009
HSBC is working on deals to sell three prized possessions, office assets on New York’s Fifth Avenue, Paris’ Champs Elysees, and London’s Canary Wharf. The assets are being marketed by CBRE as sale-leasebacks, and present the rare opportunity to acquire some of the world’s prized real estate, at a cost of course. The sale is [...]
Read More >>London Update: Rents to 1991 Levels; Vacancy Expected to 19%
May 14, 2009
Bloomberg has an article out discussing expectations that rents shortly will be on par with 1991 levels, while vacancy numbers approach 20%. The city of London seems to differ somewhat from our local market in that they seem to be dealing with a fairly severe supply problem, whereas San Francisco and Silicon Valley have less [...]
Read More >>$2B London Loan On Deck; Default Likely
April 6, 2009
A $2B loan against nine London properties comes due in October, and it is likely that the borrower as the deal is competing with $70B of competing loans which need to be refinanced through 2010 in the UK. An amazing note on this deal is that, Only 12 banks are prepared to lend more than [...]
Read More >>Canary Wharf Owner’s Teetering on Default
March 26, 2009
Bloomberg is reporting that Songbird, the company created in 2004 to acquire London’s Canary Wharf, is getting close to violating its debt covenants. Songbird owns about half of Canary Wharf, the 97 acre area along the Thames River that is home to many financial institutions in London. According to the article, Songbird is currently building [...]
Read More >>London Comp Shows 46% 2-Year Decline; Santa Clara Parallel
March 20, 2009
A WSJ article from a few days ago discussed briefly the resale of an office building in London. New Star UK Property Unit Trust sold its Governors House office building for £70 million to GLL, an asset it acquired two-years ago (July 2007) for £124 million, representing a roughly 46% drop in the asset’s value. [...]
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