March 2010 Archives

The notion that Treasury Holdings will develop Battersea Power Station and that Ballymore will build out the acres of land it owns nearby have dimmed to a flicker today with final confirmation in the Irish Times that the many of assets of both Irish firms are now in the hands of the Irish government. Treasury's John Bruder said "a lot if not all" of their 4.8b euro portfolio is now under government control. So ends the almost-comic Irish real estate misadventure.

 
Ballymore  won't be spending money in the Nine Elms area any time soon. Treasury don't have the money to keep the Battersea show on the road for much longer, evidenced by a desire to sell a large stake. Yesterday a leading banker was asked over lunch if he's pay £1 for the 38 acres. "Not unless you knocked down the power station." Later in the day another developer was asked what he would do. "Knock down the power station, and cover the site with terrace houses laid out in the same street patterns as the rest of Battersea."

But guess what? Wandsworth council is still pretending that a consortium of developers holding land in the Nine Elms area of south London are capable of coming together and raising not just £500m for extending the tube line into the power station, but another £1.1 billion to pay for improvements to the infrastructure across the entire 200-acre development zone which includes the US embassy site and New Covent Garden.

 
That £1.6b figure was confirmed by a Wandsworth council official at MIPIM. It forms the basis of current discussions aimed at setting up a public-private partnership to raise the cash and allow development to start. You can look at what is happening in two ways; it's either tragedy or fantasy. Unless reality intervenes in the shape of an full-blown urban development corporation with full planning powers the American's will find themselves marooned on an island of empty sheds in 2017 - and New Covent Garden won't get re-built until the 2020's.

Today the builder of the Pinnacle has discovered some lenders to pay for the City Tower. The Crown Estate has discovered MP's don't like then. And Grainger (who would quite like to buy a chunk of the Crown's residential estate) has discovered the joys of baby boomers.

The meetings held at MIPIM by Khalid Affara of Arab Investments with lenders were clearly fruitful. The FT reports that bankers have agreeing to lend £650m to build the superstructure of the 1000-ft Pinnacle Tower in the City. This deal will no doubt be provisional on the one big letting of 200 000 plus sq ft discussed in the Standard column on February 26. Has that deal has now been signed?  If so, who is it? 

Crown Estate CEO Roger Bright will have seen the adverse Treasury Select Committee report which gets published today. The report contains BBC-like criticisms of an organisation overreaching itself. It will cast a chill - and bring into question the political wisdom of selling the London residential Estate for £250m in the face of well-organised resistance.

Grainger is one of the front runners for this 1300-home portfolio. But, right now, it's the coming bump in ageing baby-boomers and the dwindling tail of regulated tenancies that concerns the listed residential landlord. At chat with the amiable and patient chief executive Andrew Cunningham at MIPIM found him thinking hard about how Grainger's would cope with its £870m portfolio of regulated tenancies as the occupants (average age 72) die off. 

Over a beer at the Majestic, Cunningham suggested that those born after the Second World War, rather than before, would provide the long-term solution for Grainger, which already has a 31% share of the equity release market. No doubt he had in mind the preparations Grainger were  already making for the £31m bid for Sovereign Reversions reported yesterday on EGi.

A thin weekend of property news. Saturday's papers carried Canary Wharf's results. The FT and Telegraph were clearly positive, but the Times produced a rather confused account of a row with Lehman's administrators, which suggests that Canary Wharf will get legal with PwC if they don't pay the rent for the large chunk of empty space in what was Lehman Towers.

 
Apart from that, you are left with news in the Independent on Sunday that Knight Frank are selling Grant Bovey's collapsed buy-to-let empire, a short item in the Telegraph quoting NB Real Estate saying City rents have gone up by 12%, and piece in the Times on an eco-friendly dogs home. Apart, that is, from a murky tale of insider dealing in the Telegraph involving Taylor Wimpey and Segro. Happily neither the house builder nor the industrial property company, formerly known as Slough Estates, are involved in any way.

What seems to have happened is that those involved in assembling rights issues in both companies leaked the news to their City mates who bought the shares in Segro, which raised £554m in March 2009 and Taylor Wimpey which raised £533m two months later. The Financial Services Authority are letting it be known that the trades are just part of a much wider investigation into insider trading that saw seven individuals arrested last week.

Well, fine. But hands up anybody who did not know by February that Segro was going to make a cash call? EGi carried reports of reports on the 6th Feb and again on the 19th. As for Taylor Wimpey, hands up anyone who did not know from about the same time that the giant house builder had two options; debt restructuring and cash call - or death. By May the open secret that a rights issue was imminent was so open to be no longer considered a secret.

It looks like the British Retail Consortium is less than impressed with a series of hand-wringing statements put out this week by the British Property Federation ahead of concerns that yet more shops could go bust this weekend after failing to pay their quarterly rents yesterday. In this morning's Telegraph Stephen Robertson, BRC director-general, said: "We welcome this public commitment by landlords to be more flexible, but they need to back up their words with action."

Robertson says a (rather small) survey discovered that only 12% of his members had been offered the chance to pay rents monthly, rather than quarterly in advance. This "archaic" practice, as the BRC D-G calls it, is the main bone of contention between landlords and retailers who have been growling at each other since the summer of 2008 when Sir Philip Green of Arcadia let out a full-blooded howl against the practice.

The problem is that there is a group of landlords, led by Rupert Clarke of Hermes, the current president of the British Property Federation, whose concerns are genuinely felt, and who have acted as well as spoken by producing more flexible lease terms and shifted from quarterly to monthly rents when requested to do so by retailers. But there appears to be a sullen and silent majority of landlords who have no intention of jumping unless pushed.

That leads to the third problem; not that many retailers are pushing, despite what the BRC might say.So, is there a solution to an issue that seems only to concern a vociferous minority on both sides? Not really. The long term outlook for non-prime retail rents is bleak, given the debilitating effect of the internet and the slow death of secondary locations. Landlords are simply fighting what is essentially a series of rear-guard actions to slow that decline. No wonder a war of words occasionally breaks out.

Expect a quietly desperate lobbying operation to be mounted by house builders following yesterday's proposals for minimum space standards issued by the Homes & Communities Agency. The supplier of subsidised housing has worked up a whole new framework of quality standards due to be introduced in April 2011 for homes built using government grants. The key HCA conclusion is that one bed flats must a minimum of 48 M2 and two-bedders, 61M2.

The fact is that the HCA has been pushing these "Parker Morris plus 10%" for some time now. What they are clearly after is to now have these minimum sizes, based on those laid down for council houses by Sir Parker Morris in the 1960's, enshrined in a new set of standards that will set the benchmark for social housing for years to come. 

House builders fear councils will start demanding the same space standards for private homes as the price of planning permission. Given that private flats can be 30-50% smaller than the HCA proposals, they have every right to be scared; especially as a change of government might increase rather than decrease the pressure. London's Conservative Mayor, Boris Johnson, regularly rails against "rabbit hutch" homes and has made no secret of wanting to extend the HCA standards to private sector.

Lower density simply means lower land prices. But you can tell that to house builders until you are blue in the face. This week one leading developer tried very hard to convince that the 28M2 flats they are building are just what young folk need - as they are bigger than the 20M2 they were used to living in at college. What if one young folk meets another and wants to co-habit? What if two young folk breed a third? These rabbit hutches only hold one rabbit.

So, it's farewell to Conrad, Ritblat and Erdman. Last night Sir John Ritblat announced that Colliers CRE will be dropping the three initials that have stood at the end of the Colliers name for many years. Instead the business will be known simply as Colliers International from May 24th. The Ritblat connection will not be lost, as Sir John remains chairman of the business now 29.9% owned by the Canadian parent brand Colliers, which paid £8.9m for its stake in January as part of rights issue that raised £18.4m for the Aim-listed plc.

Along with the name change came the announcement that some directors, including Andrew Graham and Tom Tidy, are retiring. A new board has been set up which includes a Canadian contingent. David Izett remains in charge of the 700-strong business which has already warned it will post a £10m loss when its results are declared at the end of this month. The HQ is moving out of 9 Marylebone Lane into a spot on the corner of Welbeck Street and Wigmore Street where some staff already live. There is now talk of a push to properly integrate IT with the other 480 Colliers offices operating in 61 countries.

Last night 300 property folk gathered in the art gallery at the Wallace Collection in Portman Square to raise a glass of Ruinard champagne to 50 years of what was Conrad Ritblat and what, for now, is Colliers CRE. The top 10 agent has been through a rough couple of years. The question now is, will this much closer connection to the parent brand bring more tangible benefits than it has in the past? The answer is that it is about two years too early to tell. But a brief chat at MIPIM with David Izett found him ready to give it a good go.

Zero property interest in the papers today, as the news manufacturing machine switches the engine off for the budget. Let's instead turn to sport and politics. Sport first: for it is becoming increasingly clear that West Ham football club are going to end up renting the Olympic Stadium. Yesterday the Olympic Legacy body published a document calling for expressions of interest in eight weeks from anyone who wants to rent the place. 

As Paul Norman discloses in his blog, West Ham have already begun to talk to the UK athletics body about a way to keep the running track without annoying the football fans. Today Building magazine discloses that the club now has the backing of Newham Council. Last week, at MIPIM, a chat with Olympic Legacy Board chair Baroness Margaret Ford made it pretty clear she would cheer if West Ham gets the fixture.

Politics: last night housing Minister John Healey lifted the skirts on Labour's election pledges on housing, which were presented to Cabinet last week. He was introduced at a Smith Institute meeting in Covent Garden by former Barratt boss, the dapper David Pretty, chair of the New Homes Marketing Board. Councils will play a "central role"; public land "will be used" said Healey, a quietly effective character in Labour circles. 

Healey refused to say which fund has been selected to provide cash for a Private Rented Sector push. (It's Aviva). But he did admit this would be "a big move" for a new Labour government. Those who think this is all a bit academic will be depressed to learn that house builders don't think the Tories will do much better. David Pretty warned that unless more land is released (not a Tory priority) "it will take 7-10 years to get output back to 2007 levels."

On Friday March 26th the British Property Federation will be putting our messages of assurance to tenants who faced problems meeting the 25th March quarter-day rent payments. No doubt these already-gathered pledges of flexibility and understanding from the likes of British Land, Segro, Prupim and Hermes have been assembled in anticipation of a fresh wave of Company Voluntary Administrations and the attendant bad publicity that comes from retailers blaming grasping landlords.

Landlords have certainly come a long way since the summer of 2008, when Sir Philip Green of Arcadia met with sullen resistance after demanding the scrapping of quarterly rents in advance and the introduction of far more flexible lease terms. Since then retailers have been falling like dominoes, forcing BPF members to edge backwards into a position today where even complaining about a CVA that slashes rents feels pretty hopeless.

This forced pragmatism is welcome. Some of the more flexible lease terms may even survive an upturn. But the reaction by the BPF to the proposal by Regus to advantageously alter the terms of leases on a number of poorly performing UK serviced office centres was met with indignation last week. That is because Regus boss Mark Dixon can afford to pay as yesterday's results on EGi show. But does he have to pay? Probably not, as the UK leases lack parent company guarantees.

At MIPIM last week a slightly grumpy Dixon did not want to talk about the row. But what he did say was that his proposals are "the reverse" of what happens when a CVA administrator walks into a bust retailer. What Dixon says he wants to do is to extend the lease at the same time as lowering the rent and thus preserve the investment value of the property. There is no doubt his landlords will come round to this view. Just give them time to get used to the idea.

Very little of fresh interest in the weekend or Monday papers: except a tale in the Scottish Mail on Sunday showing that Land Securities has become the beneficiary of murky goings-on in Glasgow. The benefit was the opportunity to buy 1.2 acres adjacent to their Buchanan Street retail centre for £10m from the receivers: an opportunity that arose in December after the collapse of a company controlled by Silverburn Shopping Centre developer, Paul Green.

The UK's biggest property company has no need to call their libel lawyers. For it is Green who is coming under close inspection for his dealings with former Glasgow City Council leader, Stephen Purcell, who quit his job 18 days ago, citing "stress and exhaustion." Purcell will be feeling even more stressed out after reading the article in the Mail, which clearly feels it has uncovered a major scandal.

"Secret auditors' advice, drawn up for a committee chaired by Councillor Purcell, was altered to conceal strong reservations about the financial strength of companies run by property tycoon Paul Green, " is how the Mail economically sums up the charges against Purcell. Green won't be too happy either.

The allegations against Jersey-based Green are that council auditors could not prove the financial strength of his offshore companies. Even so Green was chosen as the council's development partner for the £70m JV instead of Standard Commercial Property Securities, which had been proven sound. 

Well, OK, maybe there is fire beneath the smoke here. But block-headed councils across the land continually do JV deals with shell companies set up by unproven developers. Going for a firm like LandSec's in the first place would save an awful lot of time and trouble. But do they ever learn? No.

The two most interesting stories of the day are in the architectural press. Architects Journal says a design competition for a temporary structure on the empty "Cheese grater" tower site in the City has been suspended by British Land. Can this mean CEO Chris Grigg is coming round to the idea of daring to build something more permanent? This chimes with a just-published Bloomberg report saying LandSecs is looking for a partner on their Walkie Talkie tower in the City.

The other architectural story is the acidic take on MIPIM by Building Design editor Amanda Baillieu. Her complaint over the paucity of fresh ideas and the suggestion that the Homes and Communities Agency "is to the built environment what the Potato Council is to agriculture" reads far more refreshingly than the sugar-coated view of MIPIM in the Times today. This   mentions the efforts by James Caan to set up a residential fund. A meeting with the star of Dragon's Den on the boat captained by Sir Philip Green's stepson, Brett Palos, has also resulted in a short article in today's Evening Standard column.

What's the view from the 7th floor of the Majestic Hotel this morning? Quiet now. But most that came to Cannes will report having had a good week. The exhibition halls were teeming on Wednesday and Thursday, The beach-front strip between the Majestic and Carlton hotels was like Bond Street on a busy Saturday on both days.  In all, MIPIM felt like it did in 2002, when the market was  recovering from the shock of 9/11. As ever, acquaintances were renewed, relationships were repaired, clients were courted, confidences were exchanged and promises to meet up were made to be broken. In other words, a market getting back to normal.

Except for one thing: the consensus building in Cannes this week that the market is entering a pre-election pause hardened this morning with the publication of Savills results. The £60m bonus issue, so neatly leaked to the weekend press, was replaced by a warning in the Telegraph today from CEO Jeremy Helsby of "election inertia and a double dip." Maybe, who knows? But the point is that this sentiment will begin to affect the market from Monday when the MIPIM crowd return home happy to have been seen Cannes again, but slightly worried about what they heard.

Yesterday MIPIM felt a bit like its old self. There was a marked rise in the density of men in suits hurrying around, scanning their Blackberries instead of scanning for the faces they had come to see. The main halls felt full. The sun shone. The Cafe's were packed at lunchtime. There were plenty of nice dinners to attend in the evening. (Thank you Palmer Capital) But the anxiety about UK market mentioned yesterday still persists.

It won't be helped by news in the Guardian today that 650 landlord's of Blockbusters could go, well, bust. But perhaps the news in the Telegraph this morning that Derwent London's wise boss John Burns has set aside £260m for development will settle nerves here today. But maybe not: wise developers always get going when the going is still tough.

There are two views on what might of course just turn out to be a wobble in confidence. First, prices have come down far enough over the past six months, thank you very much. The election is only a few weeks away. Let's just wait and see. But I am sure it will be OK. Second, in the real, rent-paying, Blockbuster-and bust-bank-loan world there is still much blood and trouble to come. Let's hunker down.

Who knows? But to end on a more positive note, those who work for the big firms of agents will be pleased to known their bosses seem pretty confident that the blood and trouble of last year is now behind them. A chat with a few of them in the EG tent yesterday morning found most of them pretty chipper. Your chances of being made redundant have almost gone away, they say. In fact one of them wants to double the number of staff employed in the UK. Those feeling restless and want to know where to apply can turn to the EG column on Saturday.

A wander around a chilly Cannes last night was initially scary and eventually reassuring. Savills wins the best "look at me prize" for a very fetching cafe built on a small stretch of parkland close to the Palais. But apart from four Saville-ettes huddling in coats the place was deserted. So it is CBRE who wins today's "best-band" prize for their faintly depressing number on the 200m Euros of problem real estate loans that appears in today's FT.

Ever been to a party where the number of decibels emitted by the sound system is higher than the number of attendees? They closed the road outside the Carlton for what looked like a very stylish opening party. This was probably not necessary. Further east, you could have thrown a beer bottle across the bar of the normally heaving Martinez without killing anyone. But at the end of a 20 minute walk back west to the cafes on the hill was cheering.

Here it felt like the MIPIM of old. At 10.30pm most of the restaurants were packed and emitting the reassuring sounds of conviviality and laughter. A long wait for a table in the company of a bunch of extremely convivial agents had to be abandoned in favour of McDonalds. Today promises to be much busier. And no doubt Savills well-positioned cafe will attract a great deal of trade - and envious looks from rivals.

But to end on a slight down note: speaking to one or two of those coming down on the plane made it plain that activity is now starting to slow as sentiment turns cautious ahead of the election. Apart from trophy assets in London, yields are starting to move out again, by as much as 50 basis points reckoned one leading investment agent. Like MIPIM, the market is only busy in spots. "The canny guys are now selling - and the usual funds are now  buying".

Last night Boris Johnson popped down to Cannes. Later today the Mayor of London will announce that the UK will star as "the country of honour" at MIPIM next year. Boris will announce the findings of a poll which finds that 61% of businesses in the Capital expect to grow over the next 12 months. Then he will go home, drum banged, honour satisfied, leaving a determinedly optimistic group of Brits to get on with the business of the week.

The business of the week is of course banging your own corporate drum. Many happy hours are spent in marketing meetings choosing the venue, the music and the players.The problem is that, from today, so many drums will be banging it can get really hard to distinguish one tune from another. Fierce competition to be heard always breaks out, particularly between CBRE, JLL, C&W, DTZ, Knight Frank and Savills.

Savills struck up early today with a report in both the FT and the Telegraph showing that Britain is being saved by Germany when it comes to property lending. At 2.30pm they present their own operatic star in the shape of residential guru Yolanda Barnes, who will nestling close to Boris on stage to sing about the development of London. So, Tuesday's most popular band is.... Savills!

Tomorrow is another day. Tomorrow this report will come from Cannes. Watch out to see who wins the battle to orchestrate coverage. Can CBRE impress listeners with a classical European Investment briefing at 10.00am? Or will JLL's more populist choice of the top ten predictions for property at 11.00am get more air time? Or will some unrehearsed piece of music steal the show? Goodness, that would be nice...

Nice to see that British Land chief Chris Grigg is letting his newly-recruited lieutenants speak for themselves. This morning's FT carries quotes from both chief investment officer Steve Smith and head of retail, Charles Maudsley, the pair brought in to fill the hole left by the resignation of retail director Andrew Jones and two of his lieutenants last October. 

What they say is not the point, nor is it particularly startling. ("We want to do more joint ventures"). The point is that Grigg has begun a campaign to put out a unified and coherent set of messages about a business that had appeared unsure which of a dozen paths to tread since well before the loss of Jones & Co. 

Grigg, who only joined BL in early 2009 from Barclay's Bank, has been punished for sending out mixed messages: the BL share price has badly underperformed rivals Land Securities and Hammerson over the past 12 months. This is mainly due to a perception that Grigg was, a) too hasty in selling half of Broadgate and, b) a man inclined to want to wander where his fancy new head of strategy took him.

No doubt there have been some frank conversations between the straight-talking Smith and Grigg. No doubt the always-frank Maudsley has backed his former Axa colleague in suggesting that BL needs to broadcast clearer signals to the market: he certainly broadcast a clear message in Friday's Standard column.

Smith and Maudsley are now settling into their respective places around the boardroom table. Grigg himself has a year of not-that-pleasant experience behind him. The market is improving. Expect more pleasant stories about BL in the coming months: and maybe even a lift in the share price relative to its rivals.

Savills has lapsed into the bad habit of half- apologising for the size of bonus payouts - and, worse, foreshadowing the year-end results, days before telling the stock exchange. 

 
On 8th March last year  "sources" told the Sunday Times that the bonus pool would be £60m and that 2008 operating profits "were expected" to fall from £85m to £31m. On March 11 2009 profits of £33m were declared and deep in the accounts that £60m bonus was mentioned.

Yesterday the Sunday Times carried an almost perfect replica of last year's story. There will be a £60m bonus payout this year and 2009 profits "are expected to be" around £24m. On Thursday Savills will presumably declare pre-exceptional profits of  £27m  - and again bury the bonus payment deep within the accounts. 

The mystery is not why Savills tells a newspaper what its top-line results might be before telling the stock market. Giving the story to one source ensures a more kindly light is shone on the bad news. Once that bad news is revealed it is of less interest to those who have to wait for the official announcement. Easy really.

The real mystery is why Savills thinks the news is bad. Can this normally confident business really be worried that shareholders will be upset that the bonus is more than double the profits?  Savills has been about the most successful agent in Britain in terms of growth - precisely because of the bonus culture. What's to be worried about guys? You're not bankers.

Jones Lang LaSalle's are getting posh new neighbours - and Minerva is going to have to learn to live with its South African neighbour, are the messages in today's Standard column.

The new owners of Kleinwort Benson officially confirm an EGi report in February that 350 or so bankers will be moving into the rather lovely Scottish Widows development, just down the street from Hanover Square. JLL are joint agents of the 52 000 sq ft scheme, which has let for just over £80 sq ft. But the deal will also please fledgling West End agent H2SO, joint agents on 14 St George Street, who held a bibulous party last night for more than 400 in the well-cut D2 development in Savile Row.

The clear message for Minerva is contained in the text of today's main story in the Standard: Your 29.9% shareholder Nathan Kirsh is not going to go away just because he has made a failed bid - and it might be a good idea to talk to Kirsch's man in London, Philip Lewis. Lambert Smith's deputy chairman appears to be the man who tipped the 78-year old South African two years ago that buying into Minerva would be a good idea. Indeed. Kirsh has made a paper profit of £70, despite which, he is not going to sell.

Let's hope the sub-editors on the paper version of today's FT managed to change the spelling of the long word for shed in this morning's Web story: "Segro pulls out of BAA wharehouse sale." Underneath is a cautionary tale of what happens when you negotiate selling a collection of warehouses for what seems like forever: And perhaps the perils of employing an investment bank rather than a commercial agent to lead the sale.

In June 2007 Spanish group Ferrovial hired Morgan Stanley to flog off various property interests in the group they spend far too much money buying in 2006. Not a good moment to choose in retrospect. Plunging values caused a deal to sell some bits to Prologis to collapse in 2008. But Segro has been interested since at least 2007 in taking BAA' half half-share in a £500m collection of sheds around Heathrow and Gatwick owned jointly with Aviva.

 
Now Segro has told Morgan Stanley "no thanks" after two years of negotiations. The clear implication is that that Segro CEO Ian Coull has baulked at the price, which Morgan Stanley has presumably inched up and up over the last six months. Is BAA paying the bankers by the hour for their fruitless efforts? If CBRE or King Sturge were leading this deal on the usual no-sale no-fee basis, this saga would surely have been concluded by now.

Serviced office supplier Regus is threatening to put a number of struggling centres among its 135 UK branches into some form of administration unless the landlords agree to cut rents, according to the FT today. Chief executive Mark Dixon has clearly picked up a few tips from struggling retailers - and learned the lessons of his own near-bankruptcy 10 years ago when he stuck by his lease obligations during a thin patch.

But this time around Regus is not a struggling business. Dixon has nearly 1000 branches around the world and £230 million in the bank. In the six months to June an operating profit of £68m was made on turnover up 10% at £557m. But he did warn in September that conditions were "extremely challenging" in Britain, where income fell slightly to £98.5m.

Even so, his landlords are going to be very fed up with getting threatening letters from the man who has just been shortlisted in the FTSE 250 Entrepreneur of the Year awards. Although quite what their lawyers were doing letting them agree to leases without ultimate parent company guarantees, who knows? After all, this situation cannot have been hard to predict.

Next week Mark Dixon will be popping down to MIPIM from his vineyard north of St Tropez. On the Tuesday at 11.30 am he will launch a "white paper" on the future of commercial property, based upon opinions of real estate directors at the BBC, Nokia, RBS, GSK and Accenture. The survey concludes that long-term leases will become the exception rather than the norm. Let's hope no aggrieved landlords turn up to challenge that view.

Few hearts will bleed at the news in the Telegraph this morning that Vincent Tchenguiz has been forced to sell his Lamborghini after his management company made a £38m loss. But that loss is minuscule compared to the billions squandered on real estate by Citibank during the boom. The giant US Bank has been so sickened by the losses that it has signed over its 60 strong property team and $12.5b of gross assets to a private equity firm called Apollo Management. Nobody wants to tell the FT the net asset value - or how little Apollo paid.

This side of the pond the big news is of course the split of Liberty International into Capital Shopping Centres, a £4.6b investment REIT, run by the current Liberty chief David Fischel and Capital & Counties, a brand-new development business with a very old name to be run by Ian Hawksworth. The story is extremely well covered in The Times, which also carries a profile of Donald Gordon, the 79-year-old South African who founded the business. 

The only point left uncovered by the all the papers is the non-financial reason why this split was a) inevitable and b) likely to work: the completely differing personalities involved on each side of the business and the waning influence of Gordon. David Fischel is a roundhead and Ian Hawksworth a cavalier, and "Donnie" now only has 15% of both businesses and is getting on a bit. Agreeing to split will probably be a slight relief to both parties.

Fischel is a slight, self-effacing, careful character who has run Liberty under the stern direction of Donald Gordon since the early nineties from a modest, if slightly shabby HQ in Victoria. Ian Hawksworth is a large and very confident man who came over from Hong Kong in 2006 and joined Liberty after a plan to head up Grosvenor's development business went awry. His sidekick Gary Yardley is of similar stamp. There will soon be no mistake that two very different businesses have been hiding under one roof, one bursting to get out.

Is the City in for a fresh crop of office developments to add to the stunted shoots left over from the last boom? Toby Courtauld of Great Portland tells Bloomberg today that he quite fancies starting an 810 000 sq ft development on land the company owns on Bishopsgate. Veteran property man James Tuckey hints at developments yet unknown.

The former chief executive of MEPC, who was shot by a mugger in Dallas in 1990, is now chairman of Brookfield Europe. This is the giant Canadian Fund which swallowed up Aussie builder Multiplex, which is building the footings for the Pinnacle, the tallest tower in the City.  Brookfield is building a humongous real estate fund and is looking for spend its money.

Tuckey talks about the "interesting opportunities" he has seen. What could they be? Well, there is still one UBS-owned chunk of land next to Broadgate - and then there is the 2.8 acre site put together painstakingly by Mark Morris and Morris Golker in EC3: That was going to be the site of a new 1.32m sq ft HQ for Deutche Bank, before the bank got cold feet.

No doubt City agents could come up with a few more examples, including what was going to be the new HQ for JP Morgan on London Wall. They are of course off to Canary Wharf and into a purpose build new HQ - or are they? City folk are still hoping to persuade them to stay. Wharf folk are saying why bother with a new HQ? After all, what is left of Lehman Brothers will be off to the City next year under the Nomura flag. That leaves a lovely 1m sq ft building empty, apart from lonely Jones Lang on one floor. Why build another tower?

Two strong stories this morning. Former British Land director, Andrew Jones, has got it together six months after quitting as head of retail, and leaks his plans to raise £150m on the stock market to the FT. The disastrous cost of buying Foxtons finally leaks out in the Telegraph - and confirms a valuation made by Savills at the time of the sale in May 2007.

Jones is to set up a new listed company called Metric Property. His fellow directors are to be Valentine Beresford and Mark Stirling, two senior BL colleagues, who left at the same time. The trio, who used to work together at Pillar Properties, are following in the footsteps of their mentors Patrick Vaughan and Raymond Mould, who floated London & Stamford in late 2007 - and have done very well since.

The only mild surprise is the cautious initial ambition: raising just £150m and indicating gearing will be no more than 50%, by suggesting that they will have £300m to spend. That is only enough to buy a handful of small shopping centres or one big one. There is also the issue of vanishing bargains. Prices have risen considerably in six months since they quit. But this well-connected trio have presumably earmarked some deals.

BC Partners got the non-bargain of the decade when they paid Jon Hunt £360m for Foxtons in May 2007. A £218m write down is revealed in the long-delayed accounts for 2008. Take that from the £360m purchase price and you get £142m: a figure the top end of what Savills reckoned Foxtons was worth in 2007, when they were asked to name their price. Hunt is now spending some of his millions building up a commercial property empire. Much wiser.

There are no property stories worth reading in the UK national press this weekend, unless you count the dismal forecast in the Guardian about Britain's homeowners facing "10 years of stagnation," according to a not terribly well-known economist. So, let's turn to the Irish Sunday Independent instead, and "Glenda and Johnny; a magnificent obsession:" as this much more entertaining story is billed on the front page of the paper.

The Johnny in question is John Ronan, who jointly runs the biggest property company in Ireland, Treasury Holdings. A company which controls the stalled  £3b development of Battersea Power Station. Glenda is Glenda Gilson, a former model and former girlfriend of Ronan.The pair had a row-by-text over her continued use of his Range Rover while watching the England v Ireland Rugby match in separate spots last weekend. It ended with him coming to her hotel bar and the pair getting into a scrum says the paper.

"Eye-witnesses say Gilson kicked her ex-lover twice 'He buckled over the minute she kicked him, and he was shouting 'my f****** balls'. It was madness. As she turned to leave, Johnny then took a swing at her and made contact with her backside." She told friends afterwards: 'I'm f****** sick of this. All my friends are telling me you're f*****.' "

Not quite. That night same night our man jets off to Marrakesh with former Miss World Rosanna Davidson - a friend of Glenda. Ms Davidson explains in an accompanying article that she was unable to raise her own boyfriend (it was, after all, 2.30am by then) and ask him to join the flight. "In the cold, sober light of day we just thought, what on earth have we done?" she laughed. "But then we said let's enjoy it. And we'll be home by tomorrow."

No doubt a 1000 times the fun of jetting around, trying to find a co- investor for Battersea.

The only new-ish story today comes from the FT, which details Gerald Ronson's plans to build a hotel and apartments next door to his just-about-to-be-topped-out tower in Bishopsgate. EG disclosed these plans in late 2008, but the FT goes into greater detail, as Heron has now submitted the drawings to the City for approval.

It says something for Ronson's powers of persuasion that he has managed to get a City Corporation always bitterly opposed to residential development to agree not just to one block of flats, but two. Contractors are currently tendering to build a 36-storey block of 295 flats next door to the Barbican, on which marketing began this week with adverts in City AM.

In Bishopsgate there will be a 190-bedroom hotel and 120 apartments. The £500m scheme was originally planned as a "baby" Heron office tower, next to its 800-ft tall dad. Talking of the tower, Ronson discloses they are talking to four potential occupiers. You can almost feel an announcement coming on, timed perhaps for the annual Heron lunch on April 13th.

The serviced apartments "will be among the most expensive in London." This news should interest Nick and Christian Candy, who have about 40-hyper luxury flats coming on the market shortly in Knightsbridge at about £4000 sq ft. Ronson reconnoitred Knightsbridge about the time he was planning Bishopsgate. How much will he charge in the City: guesses between £2000 and £3000 only please.

Today's most interesting news is the appointment of Rob Bould as chief executive of GVA Grimley - the firm's third new boss in as many years. The announcement betrays the sound of jostling among what is called "the leadership team" at the top of a 1000-strong firm which sold 22.5% of its equity to the venture capital arm of Lloyds TSB in 2007.

About a year after chief executive Bob Barnett sealed that well-timed deal, he stepped aside in favour of Malcolm Whetstone, who we are told today "continues" as managing director. But over his head comes in a new chief executive in the familiar shape of Rob Bould, head of capital markets and the man not given the top job in 2005, when the Birmingham faction voted in favour of Barnett.

Over Bould's head comes in Stephen Brown, head of planning and regeneration. He is now "executive chairman". Brown - who seems to have orchestrated the shuffle - takes his place at the head of the boardroom table in favour of the ex-KPMG man Steve Halbert. He has been demoted from chairman to deputy chairman. Halbert was a Lloyds-inspired appointee, who took over from another Lloyds choice, former Atkins boss Mike Jeffries, who barely lasted nine months before resigning in December 2008.

Who knows what the employees think of all this milling around on a crowded top deck? But the 165 associate partners who did not benefit from the part-sale to Lloyds must be getting restive. They were given 15% of the business in shares, which are only redeemable once GVA Grimley float: for understandable reasons the 2007 half-promise to do so in 3 years has not been met. But when? "When market conditions dictate" says a spokesman.

Good news today. This morning  Reuters have broadcast a Cushman & Wakefield report showing the volume of global real estate deals is forecast to surge by 30% in 2010 to $478b, led by China, where transaction levels have already doubled in 12 months. But the figures need to be put in perspective. In 2007 the figure was more than double the 2010 forecast.

Meta-forecasts like this can also feel pretty meaningless to the agent in Market Harborough trying to sell a secondary retail unit. But they do have effect of cheering everyone up for a bit and nudging those who are sitting on top of the mountains of cash into action. C&W reckon volumes in the US will jump 48%. In the Emea region (which includes Market Harborough) the number of deals done in 2010 will rise by 43%, led by the UK.

The European edition of the Wall Street Journal reaches much  the same conclusion, without, it seems, talking to Cushman & Wakefield. The paper has looked at some of the big deals done in January and February and those that might be done in March and reached this sunny deduction - before suggesting it could all change if the economy stalls. Well, yes, of course.

One deal that finally does look like it is going ahead is the sale of the NOHO site in central London by Kaupthing. The FT reports that the bust bank is now going to sell the empty three acres on which more than £200m in loans were advanced to fund a scheme by the Candy Brothers that foundered. Kaupthing was thinking about entering into a development JV with Stanhope who have drawn up new plans.But it now looks like they just want out. So, one more deal to be done - at about half the level of the debt if they are very lucky.

Today's Times carries a short account of the charging of Achilleas Kallakis on a £61m commercial property fraud. A more thorough account of the story broken on EGi yesterday appears in the Daily Telegraph. But English reporting restrictions being what they are, not much more can be said before May 4th when the trial opens at Southwark Crown Court.

These restrictions do not apply in America. So, if you want to indulge in a moment of schadenfreude at the fate of a cocky, cocaine-snorting, 38-year old property "tycoon," turn to today's New York Times. The paper carries a wonderfully detailed account by Christine Haughney of the high life and subsequent bad times of Adam B Hochfelder.

This son of a New York garment manufacturer built up stakes in 8m sq ft of commercial properties during the 2002-2007 gold rush. He ran a business called Max Capital and was seen at all the best real estate parties. Everyone loved Adam: until 2008, when he was indicted on a $17m property-related forgery and deceit charge. Now a further charge of swindling investors out of $2.5m has been added.

Hochfelder quickly embraced the role of real estate mogul, says the paper. "He hired a driver, flew on private jets and spent lavishly on building his company's image, focusing on details as small as the design of Max Capital mints." 

"He had a winning personality," said Barry M. Gosin, chief executive of the real estate brokerage firm Newmark Knight Frank, where Mr. Hochfelder briefly worked and which later negotiated leasing deals at Mr. Hochfelder's buildings. "He always wanted to be liked, and he always wanted to accommodate people."

"Last month's indictment charged that he stole $2.5 million from investors, including a member of his wedding party and Jason Hirschhorn, a co-president of MySpace, who thought they were buying a stake in the Sagamore Hotel on Lake George in upstate New York."

Hochfelder has pleaded his innocence. But a lack of reporting restrictions in America means he has been found guilty by the New York Times.

Drivers Jonas won't be going to MIPIM in two weeks time: Last week the French courts fined them 100 000 Euros for "parasitical" behaviour for operating out of a branded café on the Croisette, rather than take a stand in the Palais des Festivals. MIPIM organisers Reed Midem tell the Daily Telegraph today that "while this judgment vindicates Reed Midem's decision to go to court, it primarily protects our Mipim clients who register and operate in good faith within the show venue."

What DJ will say is probably unprintable. The firm may be too busy today to say anything, as this is the day of the formal marriage with Deliotte. But they and their lawyers Herbert Smith will have been shocked to have lost the case. It will presumably now be up to the senior partner of Deloitte, rather Nick Shepherd of DJ, to decide upon an appeal.

The firm has only been fined one-third of the original damages sought, as you will see in the original report of the case in my Standard column last October. There will be plenty of others who have operated like DJ for years, and would like them to appeal. But it is understood that the costs are to be split. With that, and the relatively small fine, it feels like DJ will swallow hard and get on with life - and never darken the doors of MIPIM again. But, let's see.