Royal Wharf, one of London’s largest development sites, has been purchased by Singapore-listed developer Oxley Holdings from Ballymore Group for £200 million (S$397.1 million).
Oxley Chief Executive, Ching Chiat Kwong, said: “Royal Wharf is an outstanding opportunity and offers a blank canvas to create something very special for London.”
Oxley intends to build more than 3,400 homes and various commercial, leisure, retail and educational facilities on the 40 acre site, creating a new district in London.
Located in London’s Royal Docks, Royal Wharf has a gross effective area (GEA) of 363,000 sq m and an extensive 500 metre River Thames frontage. With excellent transport links and international connections as well as boat links, the site is the largest London development opportunity to hit the market since the Battersea Power Station in 2012.
Responding, Ian Loh, Head of Investment & Capital Transactions at Knight Frank, which brokered the sale, said that the various rounds of cooling measures in Singapore may have prompted local developers, such as Oxley Holdings, “to eye on overseas development opportunities”.
Meanwhile, London Mayor Boris Johnson said: “My team and I met with Oxley Holdings on our trade mission to China last month and I am thrilled at this demonstration of their confidence in our great city. This type of deal is exactly why I spent six days meeting businessmen and officials in China banging the drum for the capital, and it is further evidence of the colossal appetite of developers from the Far East and elsewhere to invest in London.”
David Slater, Director of International Business Development at London & Partners, the Mayor’s official promotional organisation for London, said the deal marked another important milestone in the regeneration of London.
“It comes as a direct result of the Mayor’s trade mission, in which we were able to showcase London’s exciting development opportunities to potential international investors, and I am delighted that Oxley Holdings will now be taking the Royal Wharf development forward,” he added.
Image: Artist’s impression of Royal Wharf in London. (Source: Knight Frank)
Romesh Navaratnarajah, Senior Editor at PropertyGuru, edited this story. To contact him about this or other stories email romesh@propertyguru.com.sg
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