Claims made by online agent eMoov that the Crown Estate is sitting on over £800m worth of empty properties in London alone, which could be turned into new homes, have been shot down.
The Crown Estate says that almost all the “empty properties” are in fact car parking spaces, or are empty awaiting redevelopment.
The claims were made in City AM which said it had done an investigation, but went on to quote Russell Quirk.
He told City AM: “We’ve been saying for some time that empty publicly owned properties are an important part of the solution to the housing deficit, but the sheer total is a pretty astonishing value.”
According to City AM, there are 312 empty properties in Greater London owned by the Crown Estate, which eMoov estimates to be worth £835m, and which could be transformed into 546 new flats.
According to eMoov, the empty properties owned by the Crown Estate include three meeting rooms in Regent Street which have been empty for over 12 years, and a 6,000 sq ft space on Air Street which has been empty since 2007.
The story was largely repeated in the Independent.
But the Crown Estate said the claims were nonsense. It said: “Our void rates are actually 2% across our London portfolio.
“This is from a portfolio totalling 8m ft2 across our Regent Street and St James’s holdings.
“City AM reported that we have £800m of vacant properties in London.
“This is incorrect: 92% of the space and property units they analysed are in fact car parking spaces, properties vacant for redevelopment, demolished as part of a redevelopment, or have been sold, let or occupied already.
“The Regent Street meeting rooms referenced by City AM are rooms used by the tenants of one of our office blocks. The Air Street space was vacant to enable a development that we’ve just completed, and a development in the pipeline.
“The Crown Estate holds almost £6bn of real estate in central London, predominantly comprising our holdings in Regent Street and St James’s.
“Our major redevelopment of these areas has created international shopping and business destinations, contributing to London’s status as a world city.
“It is of course not possible to progress a development of a building whilst it is occupied.
“Our £1.5bn investment in the West End is one of the key contributors to our financial success and an active approach to managing our holdings last year delivered significant returns to the public finances.
“Last year we achieved a total return (net revenue and capital growth) of over 20%, which means we outperformed many of our peers in the private sector. Capital value was up 16% and net income profit, which is paid entirely to Treasury, was up 6.7% to £285m.
“We are currently mid-way through our most substantial redevelopment programme in our history.
“Development schemes on site or completed have delivered over 2m sq ft of new retail, office, leisure and residential space.”
An unfounded claim from The Quirkster??
Oh, my! What is the world coming to??
;o)
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Doesn’t really matter does it – more national coverage for Emoov. Job done
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Was in the Independent too, so 2 X national coverage for both online and print
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Does that mean you were in charge of this PR not Stephen, the old ‘all news is good news’ defence?
“It’s all right gov; Russell (Wolfy Smith) Brand thought it was brilliant! POWER TO THE PEOPLE!”
Not sure Stephen will appreciate being on deck so early!
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It worries me that so few seemingly reputable journalists fail to carry out even the most basic of cross-referencing of their story.
If an agent made such a material error, that same journalist, I suspect, would be screaming ‘CPR offence’ from the rooftops to their readership.
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Brilliant, everyone considers him to be a bit of a prat and now the queen does too………..however, his ability to get nuts deep in absolutely any story on the fringes of the press is worthy of a nod from all of us.
Jonnie
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Nuts deep? Oh my, what a comment
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Have some respect Jonnie the bloke is an expert, making a bit of a stir of things in the America’s by all accounts!
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valuations wrong, facts wrong, upset someone and overvalue your own importance!
Sounds like a regular day for an online agent!!!
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