A north London retail park has been acquired by the world’s largest warehouse company in a landmark deal that will see it converted into space for fulfilling online deliveries.
Prologis, which is listed on the New York stock exchange, has acquired the 128,000 sq ft Ravenside retail park in Edmonton to convert it into warehouses for ecommerce deliveries.
The site was bought for £51.4m from investment manager M&G, according to a report by property news website React News.
It is thought to represent the first deal of its kind in the UK and underlines the growing shift from bricks-and-mortar retail to online.
Current retail tenants on the park include the soon to be defunct Mothercare UK, Argos, Wren Kitchens and a 60,000 sq ft branch of Wickes.
With a host of retailers due to issue Christmas trading updates this week, many in the retail property sector have already predicted that 2020 will continue the downward trend in the sector.
Knight Frank’s Retail Property Market Outlook 2020 forecasts that retail rental values will fall 2% this year, with retail warehouses predicted to register a 1.8% decline and shopping centres a 2.3% drop.
The report noted that shopping centres have seen “falling values for over four years now” with many now worth half what they were in 2016. It also said that “in line with high street and shopping centres, investment volumes in the retail warehouse space have fallen significantly”.
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