Schroder UK Real Estate Fund (SREF) has signed 63,000 sq ft of new lettings at the Hall Road Retail Park in Norwich, securing Iceland Food Warehouse (“Iceland”) and Home Bargains as new entrants alongside a reconfigured unit for DIY specialist Homebase. A fourth unit of 16,500 sq ft is available to let.
Homebase originally occupied the entire 80,000 sq ft unit at the retail park before its 2018 company voluntary arrangement (CVA) significantly reduced its rent. In response, SREF reconfigured the store, moving Homebase into a 30,000 sq ft unit on a new 10-year lease and letting 13,000 sq ft and 20,000 sq ft to Iceland and Home Bargains respectively on new 10 and 15-year terms, with 16,500 sq ft still to be let.
Hall Road Retail Park is located on the junction of Hall Road and Barrett Road, south of Norwich’s city centre. Alongside Homebase, current tenants include Aldi, Pets at Home, Aldis and Hughes. The addition of Home Bargains and Iceland adds to the strong tenant line-up and serves to diversify SREF’s income to another two strong covenants.
The alterations at Hall Road Retail Park follow SREF’s £3m investment into the Meadows Retail Park in Chelmsford, which will see the former 24,750 sq ft Argos reconfigured into a PureGym, TGI Fridays and Cosy Club.
Tom Woolven, Investment Manager, Schroder UK Real Estate Fund, comments: “By downsizing Homebase’s space at the retail park, we have created units to attract two new occupiers to the park, whilst retaining the Homebase brand on a new lease that is better aligned to their current requirements. As landlords, we seek to take a proactive approach to review our assets and ensure they provide the accommodation that modern tenants need, thus keeping ahead of the curve to increase our rental income and ensuring we can continue to aim to deliver investor returns ahead of our benchmark.”
SREF, represented by Edgerley Simpson Howe, is currently on site undertaking landlord works with the new Homebase scheduled to open in February, while Iceland and Home Bargains are expected to open by the end of the year.
