Facebook owner Meta shells out £149m to break London Regent’s Place lease
Facebook owner Meta Platforms surrendered one of its two buildings at Regent’s Place, paying £149m at the end of September to break the lease.
Property developer British Land revealed that the end of the lease will result in post interest savings of 0.6 pence for the half year. The £149m fee was first reported by the FT.
British Land said: “Meta’s surrender of our building at 1 Triton Square also enables us to accelerate our plans to reposition Regent’s Place as London’s premier Innovation and Life Sciences campus.”
Chief of the firm, Simon Carter, said that he was pleased with the momentum in the business, reporting “strong leasing activity,” particularly in its retail parks portfolio.
Just last week, the company said it would upgrade its full-year estimated retail value for its retail parks from between two to four per cent to between three to five per cent after demand for space at its parks showed signs of heating up.
The FTSE 250 firm said it was continuing to see “significant leasing momentum” across its circa 40 retail parks, and in the five months to the end of August leased 511,000 sq ft of space across its parks.
Retail parks have been an appealing model for retailers as they are often cheaper than traditional high street or shopping centre leases.
The company’s share price grew 1.14 per cent off as markets responded to the news.
It comes amid a challenging period for the commercial property sector, as high interest rates and a decline in activity in the market has led to the value of many buildings being lowered.
Carter said: “Operationally we are seeing strong leasing activity which reflects the exceptional quality of our portfolio and has resulted in our recent upgrade of the expected ERV growth in retail parks.
“We have also strengthened our balance sheet in the period and continue to actively recycle capital with the disposal of non-core assets ahead of book value.”
Morning Wire has contacted Meta for a comment.