Forsters acts for Mayer Real Estate on its debut UK property purchase

Forsters has acted for Mayer Real Estate (MRE) on its first UK property acquisition. MRE is part of the privately owned Mayer Group which is the largest auto and transport group in Israel. MRE coordinates the Mayer Group’s activities in the real estate sectors and has substantial investments throughout Israel and Western Europe.

MRE last week entered the UK market by acquiring the freehold of the Arundel Gate mixed use scheme in Sheffield city centre for £16.5 million representing a net initial yield of 6.6%.

Arundel Gate is a mixed use scheme comprising a large car park, a live music venue and a cinema. The car park is let to Bishopsgate Parking and sublet to NCP and accounts for more than 70% of the property’s income. The other tenants are Academy Music Group (O2 Academy) and Odeon Cinemas. The existing leases provide for a fixed annual rent increases of more than 2.5%. MRE considers that Arundel Gate offers an excellent opportunity for future performance, not only due to the growth written into the existing leases, but also given the highly reversionary nature of certain elements of the building and the future redevelopment value in this core city centre location. 

Forsters commercial property partner Matthew Swainston led the acquisition team assisted by property finance partner, Victoria Edwards.

Walker Morris acted for the sellers.