Barratt in £100m London office-to-residential conversion scheme

Barratt Developments has bought the former headquarters of the Department for Transport, reports the Times, and plans to turn the office space in Victoria into residential property.

The £100m scheme has secured planning permission to turn the Great Minster East building on Marsham Street into 60 flats, studios, four-bedroom homes and penthouses, the newspaper says, with prices starting at £700,000.

Mark Dorman, head of London residential development at Strutt & Parker, which advised sellers PFA Pension, noted that this deal is part of a “well-documented trend” in London, which has seen rising numbers of office buildings converted into residential property.

Alastair Baird, regional managing director at Barratt London, told the Times: “We will have completed the build and plan to have sold all the apartments at Great Minster East by December 2014.”