April property performance largely unchanged – CBRE
CBRE says UK commercial property performance in April was largely unchanged from the previous month at the All Property level, with total returns reaching 0.6% compared with 0.5% in March. This took the annual return to 3.1% for the year to April 2013. Capital values, however, remained flat – and have fallen by 2.8% over the past 12 months, the firm notes.
Total returns for office property in CBRE’s Monthly Index increased to 0.5% in April, with capital values remaining flat month-on-month. Central London offices boosted the figures, with returns of 0.5%, and within this Midtown office space produced a total return of 0.9% and capital value growth of 0.5%. CBRE notes that Outer London/M25 offices recorded a small but positive growth in capital value last month – the first positive monthly capital value growth in this segment of the market since August 2011.
CBRE analyst Aleksandra Starczynska said: “The performance gap between Central London offices and other parts of the UK market has started to close over the last couple of months. Although it remains the best performing market segment, both rental and capital value growth has been slowing for Central London offices and at the same time performance in other segments has been improving.”
Within the retail sector, which recorded total returns of 0.6%, shopping centres had a significant impact, recording capital value growth of 0.3%. Overall retail capital values were broadly stable at +0.1%. Industrial property total returns were 0.5%.
Rents were flat at the All Property level, for the fourth month in a row. Central London offices did see more growth in rental values, with 0.3% growth for City office space and 0.1% for offices in the West End. Elsewhere in the UK, office rents declined by 0.2%.
