Recently in Kent Category

The Market
An analysis of the offices, retail and industrial markets
Elaine Cavanagh, freelance writer, 01225 444 875, elaine@jackcav.freeserve.co.uk

People
How to make returns in a difficult market
Stacey Meadwell, Focus editor, 020 7911 1819, stacey.meadwell@rbi.co.uk
Please note Stacey is now on holiday until 4th January

Infrastructure
How will transport developments benefit the region?
Melanie Smith, Focus editorial assistant, 020 7911 1916, melanie.smith@rbi.co.uk
Please note Melanie is now on holiday until 29th December

Investment
A look at activity in the local market.
Adrian Morrison, freelance writer, 0131 556 9378, adrian.morrison@addmor.com



If writers are now on holiday please email your ideas and suggestions through and they will contact you in the New Year. No other writer or editor will be covering the features in their absence.

It takes just 14 minutes to get from St Pancras station in Central London to Ebbsfleet in North Kent using Southeastern trains new high speed rail link. It's not a particularly pretty journey as most of it passes through tunnels but it is certainly fast.

The journey time will go up by three minutes when the trains start stopping at Stratford but I was curious to know if the economic benefits to Kent would extend beyond attracting London commuters to attracting new businesses.

During the journey this morning, I spoke to deputy leader of Kent County Council, Alex King, Mandy Bearne, director of marketing and research for Locate in Kent and industrial and logistics partner at Knight Frank Paul Mussi and asked them if investment would be speeding into the county.

There are two Focuses to feast your eyes on in this week's mag: Ireland & the start of our trip around the M25 with the M25 South East features.

Ireland

Developers: Batten down the hatches its the Wild West out there. That's what David Thame found out when he went looking for what happened to Ireland's gold rush. In this week's mag he takes a closer look at how it happened and analyses who's the last man standing.

NAMA: Last week the Irish government's finalised plans for its "bad bank" and the true extent of the programme started to become apparent. David Thame's takes a look at just what the developers think of NAMA and if it really is a good thing for the local property market. He finds out that while many don't particularly like the programme the alternatives could be far worse.

Overview:IPD figures show Ireland is the hardest hit country in Europe. With CBRE predicting an office vacancy of 27% by 2010 Melanie Smith looks at the long term implications for the office market. She also takes a look at the retail and lesiure market as administrations continue to rise.

M25 South East

Offices & industrial: The supply tap continues to drip as the last few schemes that started before the recession come to fruition. But what is the fate of these schemes with take up down 60% in the first half and headline rents falling. Simon Jack investigates.

Meanwhile in retail, Elaine Cavanagh finds an unsurprisingly subdued local market. She takes an in depth look at what Croydon and Crawley are doing to counter it.  

Picture from Flickr by anyjazz65 used under the Creative Commons license

Dropping trousers, drooping rents and showing a bit of leg all feature in this week's EG as the Focus team head for the home counties.

Offices: In Surrey there's low demand but low supply is helping out with one agent saying there hasn't been a "huge dropping of trousers". Don't worry, no need to turn away just yet, we think (hope!) he's talking about incentives.

Unfortunately, in Kent developers are having to show a bit of leg and rents have dropped by a quarter. Meanwhile in Sussex the second hand market is adding to supply.

Industrial: there's one bright spot in the market, with Aldi beginning construction in Kent of its 560, 000 sq ft. Elsewhere developers are signing deals with 12 months rent-free on every five years committed to.

Retail: CACI's research shows Surrey, Sussex and Kent are the most recession-proof counties in the country. But is it really that resilient? We also look at Croydon and progress at Park Place and ask if it's time to start watering down their grand plans.

Picture from eraphernalia used under Creative Commons license