A €12 MILLION offer by developer Gerry Gannon to buy a building which had housed Friends First subsidiary Liberty Asset Management (LAM) was rejected by its owners, the High Court heard yesterday.
Mr Gannon said he made the offer to the owners of the building on Northumberland Road, Dublin, who had been renting the building to LAM, but they turned him down. He had been interested in acquiring number 54 for some time because his own headquarters is next door, at number 52, and he had previously been refused permission to extend his building.
Mr Gannon was giving evidence on the second day of proceedings by LAM for orders to make him complete a May 2006 agreement to purchase the lease for number 54. LAM is also seeking damages for losses allegedly incurred as a result of having to pay maintenance and insurance as well as the €120,000 per annum rent on the now vacated building.
The alleged agreement was intended as part of a larger deal in which Mr Gannon would rent LAM one of his other properties in Richview Office Park, Clonskeagh, and he would then take over the lease of LAM's Northumberland Road premises.
Mr Gannon told the court yesterday he was only interested in taking over the lease if LAM exercised a "break clause" whereby the lease could be assigned to new tenants, usually after five to seven years.
When he found out LAM was not going to exercise the break clause, he pulled out of this aspect of the deal, he said.
Mr Gannon told the court he has never got involved in renting properties from others, other than those with 999-year leases, and his preference was to buy properties outright.
He had offered the owners of number 54 about €12 million but they turned it down shortly before he got into negotiations with LAM. The hearing concluded yesterday and Ms Justice Mary Laffoy will give her decision later.