DOCKLANDS: FROM £275,000:INVESTORS LOOKING for a London bolthole with good rental prospects will be interested in apartments being built by Ray Grehan's Glenkerrin Homes near Canary Wharf in the London Docklands.
Rental yields of 5 to 7 per cent, coupled with the strength of the euro against sterling, are likely to attract a number of Irish investors to the scheme which is located at Westferry Road on the Isle of Dogs in E14, between Canary Wharf and City Airport.
Called The Forge, because it is built around a 19th century building that was once a forge, the development has 126 one, two and three-bedroom units with prices starting from £275,000 for a one-bed apartment.
Two-bedroom units start at £350,000; large three-bedroom apartments start at £465,000 while 12 two-bedroom duplex units in the development are priced from £390,000.
Savills, which is handling the development in London, has already logged a vast number of enquiries for the scheme which is being launched from a marketing suite on the site next Thursday, April 10th.
Interest is strong, they say, because of a shortage of new launches coming on stream in the Docklands.
At this stage just 52 of the units are being offered for sale, and 20 of these have been reserved for Irish buyers, according to Catherine O'Connor of Savills HOK in Dublin who is handling sales for the Irish.
It's a quiet neighbourhood that's popular with renters given its proximity to Canary Wharf - a seven-minute ride via Docklands Light Rail (DLR) from Mudchute station which is in walking distance of The Forge.
Canary Wharf is one of London's main employment centres, with 95,000 people currently working there, mostly in the financial services sector. Over the past 20 years the area has been transformed from a docklands landscape into a busy city quarter with a huge range of shops, restaurants, wine bars and clubs.
Rents in the area around Westferry Road are good, with one-bedroom units fetching £300 to £350 per week. Savills expects two-bedroom units at The Forge to attract rents of £450 per week, with three-beds projected to fetch up to £550.
Savills will put together a fit-out and management package for investors through its Canary Wharf office, which has a busy lettings section.
The initial phase will include a mix of one, two and three-bedroom apartments in a newly-built block flanking the converted building. These are being sold from a marketing suite elsewhere in the development, where there are two show apartments on view.
Buyers familiar with the Glenkerrin brand in Ireland will see familiar features in these show apartments - there are smart pod bathrooms, attractive Italian-style kitchens and a thoughtful use of space, with lots of storage and sleek internal doors.
Glenkerrin has several developments in the pipeline in London, with plans to build several hundred apartments there in the next five years. With a strong client base in Ireland, many of these will be sold here.
"The Irish are very active investors in London and this is a good opportunity for them to buy a quality apartment in a location that will yield an excellent return," says Glenkerrin's Ray Grehan. According to Savills, international buyers account for over one-third of all prime property purchases in E14 - a key indicator that this is now an established market where non-domestic buyers are happy to both live and invest.
Glenkerrin, which owns a hotel in London's East End, the Crown Plaza on Shoreditch High Street, has two more Docklands sites - Island Point, which is close to The Forge, and a superbly located site beside Canary Wharf where Grehan plans to build a 55-storey hotel, retail and residential development to be called City Pride.
This scheme, which is currently being designed by renowned architects Foster & Partners of Gherkin fame, will have up to 400 apartments.
A number of five-star hotel operators are interested in taking on the hotel element of the development.
The Forge, Westferry Road, London E14
Scheme of 126 apartments located between City Airport and Canary Wharf offering rental yields of 5-7 per cent.
Agent:Savills HOK
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