Recently in East of England Category

Administrations have ripped giant holes through the UK's high streets.  Cushman and Wakefield's recent report A Survey of Prime Retail Locations reveals just how big those holes are.

It says the East of England appears to be the most resilient region to departing retailers (see graph below). The region has the lowest level of availability with 6.5% of units vacant. Outer London meanwhile appears blighted by them and has the highest vacancy rate with 17.4% of units availabile.

Source: Cushman & Wakefield LLP

View Experian business failures by region Jan 2010 in a larger map

Business insolvencies across the UK are falling, in fact they are at the lowest rate since June 2007. That's the good news from Experian today.

Unfortunately for Yorkshire, it is top of the list of failures with nearly double the amount of businesses going under last month compared to virtually every other part of the country. It's closely followed by the North East.


LOSERS
Yorkshire had the highest rate of failures in January
Scotland was the only region to see a year on year increase in insolvency

WINNERS
Wales had the lowest rate of business failures in January
The South West was the most robust, with the best financial strength score in January
The North East lost the ignoble top spot as the region with the highest insolvency rate decreasing 30%

Greater London saw the highest year-on-year improvement in financial health yet had the lowest overall financial strength score of any region.

There was a brilliant turn out for the EG Cambridge reception on Friday with property players travelling from Norwich, Ispwich and Peterborough to have a tipple and a chat with us.

Below are a few pics from the event. We'll be covering the reception in the mag in our Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Suffolk Focus on the 6th March but you can see some of the pictures below right away. 

Pictures courtesy of Marcus Rose marcus@marcusrose.co.uk

Overview
What's happening in offices, retail and industrial in all three counties?
Melanie Smith, editorial assistant, 020 7911 1916, melanie.smith@estatesgazette.com

People & companies
How to make money in the current property market.
Nadia Elghamry, deputy Focus editor, 020 7911 1849, nadia.elghamry@estatesgazette.com

Science parks
Analysis of the region's biotech-based industry
Nadia Elghamry, deputy Focus editor, 020 7911 1849, nadia.elghamry@estatesgazette.com

Economy
What's in store for the three counties and what does it mean for the property industry?
Lauren Parr, senior reporter Europroperty, 0777 064 6363, laursieloo@hotmail.com

Investment
A look at the buying and selling market in all three counties.
Daniel Cunningham, senior writer, 020 7911 1822, daniel.cunningham@estatesgazette.com

Another day, and there's another end of year ranking. This times it's Experian's Insolvency Index. And the North East wins the ignoble top spot registering the highest level of insolvencies last year.

It's bad news for Newcastle landlords who've already had to entice occupiers in with ultra competitive deals, including whispers of a rent free of eight years for Tescos at Grantside's Quorum (EGi subscribers can read the full story here).

Nip across the border and Scotland saw the lowest level of insolvencies this year, although that figure seemed to accelerate in December.

Generally, Experian says the average finanical strengh for business in Great Britain improved steadily this year, after insolvencies peaked in the first half of 2009. Mid-sized businesses bore the brunt of the pain with the very large, and the very small avoid calamity more easily.

In London businesses struggled most financially  but, throughout the year the Greater London region showed the biggest improvement.

An easing of conditions for occupiers has fed through to the property industry. There were 144 property insolvencies in December 2009, down 18.6% on December 2008, but, unlike the all industry average the financial strength of the property sector actually dropped (albeit a fairly small amount) - from 84.79 to 83.63. The all industry strength was 81.37.

Click through on the continue reading link below to see the figures for financial strength by industry and insolvency figures by sector.

Norwich's residents have got a tad over excited about the long awaited arrival of Apple's store at Chapelfields shopping centre. As we found out back in September, owners Capital Shopping Centre's letting to the US tech firm has been a rather badly kept secret.

In fact one local got so excited he decided to write a song about it on You Tube, celebrating the opening and bemoaning the fact that for too long Cambridge was his nearest store. To the tune of The Wurzels' hit classic Combine Harvester it includes the immortal lines:

"I drove my tractor down to London last night, and threw my pitchfork at your Regent Street site.

Cos something telling me that you're avoiding me, come on now Apple you have something that I need....now I've got a brand new Norwich Apple store right in Chapelfields."

This week in the magazine we turn to the East of England and find there are some beacons of light appearing.

One of those is sentiment which seems to be improving, or at least not getting any worse. Stacey analyses the results of EG's latest sentiment survey and finds out just what the local property industry thinks is in store for the immediate future. She's also talked to the ERBI to find out how local technology firms are actually faring.

Drilling down to the individual cities; Cambridge's guided bus is (finally) about to become a reality. Some office park developers think it will boost their rents but they are largely the minority. Will it do any good in the current market?
In the city centre there's been no development for 15years. With the UK market in turmoil is that likely to change and what effect is that having on returns?

Norwich is still waiting for two large schemes by locally-based developer Targetfollow. I've quizzed them about their intentions and ask how much longer will Norwich have to wait? In retail, Chapelfield shopping centre seems to be bedding down with a letting to Apple (oops sorry I'm not meant to mention that) but what deals are landlords in other parts of the city doing?

And in Suffolk secondary office rents are actually rising  but it's at the expense of prime office space, while industrial is suffering heavily after international trade takes a tumble at the port of Felixstowe.

Now here's a story that's completely bananas. Apparently a certain US technology firm, which sounds like something you'd find in a fruit bowl, is fitting out in Chapelfield shopping centre in Norwich.

It's great news for the four-year-old centre which has taken some time to bed down in the city, and it should be the Apple of their eye. But talk to owners CSC and they flatly deny all knowledge of the juicy letting. What makes this story completely bonkers is if you were to take a walk along the upper mall of the centre you'd see the fruity retailer's signs proudly proclaiming their debut in the city.

Do a job search on the occupier's website and look what pops up on the right hand side under "new stores, new opportunities". This sign announcing the project is fairly conclusive too.

CSC say client confidentiality forbids them from saying anything. In fact, they can't even talk about the opening date for "security reasons".

In fairness to them they clearly find the whole thing slightly ridiculous, but isn't this just red tape gone mad?

It's a shame they can't shout it from the rooftops because according to City AM a certain US technology firm on Regent Street in London is taking a big bite out of the retail market.

Photo from Flickr by 1Happysnapper( is catching up slowly) used the Creative Commons license

 

Ah, the romance of punting on the Cam. Cue soft floaty classical music. Tourists serenely drift down the river admiring the college backs, their peace disturbed only by the soft pop of a champagne cork or the occasional boisterous duck.

Erm, scratch that. It was more like Hawaii Five-O yesterday as 30 local agents, with Barker Storey Matthews travelling from as far away as Peterborough and Huntingdon, descended on the river, all chomping at the bit to win the much coveted Punting Champion 2009 title.

Sentiment is so important in the property industry and since the start of the year we have been tracking how people in key markets around the country feel about their industry and its prospects for the coming months.

We are in the process of doing the second surveys for Scotland (Edinburgh and Glasgow), Bristol and the East of England to see if the mood has changed.

But we can't do that unless lots of people fill out our quick online survey. It's totally anonymous and we'll be publishing the full results online as well analysing them in the magazine.

So if you work in property in:
Scotland click here
Bristol click here
East of England click here

The publication dates for the features are 29 August for Scotland and 5 September for Bristol and the East of England.

Picture by yourdon on Flickr and used under creative commons