Grainger reports strong progress despite ‘fragile residential market’

One of Britain’s largest landlords, Grainger Plc (LON:GRI) told investors that it has made strong progress in last four months. The company said that whilst house price growth has slowed over the summer months in the UK, its portfolio is resilient.  

Grainger also cautioned that Britain’s property market is fragile, and as such it is acquiring assets that it believes will deliver good levels of long-term returns.
In the period up to 31st July, Grainger re-entered the market with property purchases worth £67.6m, it completed the acquisition of Sovereign Reversions - an equity release business targeting mature home owners - and it initiated discussions with private real estate fund manager Moorfield to create a joint venture for the newly acquired assets.

“Our portfolio is continuing to prove to be resilient and we are trading well, despite price growth in the general housing market slowing in the last few months reflecting the economic uncertainty,”  Grainger chief executive Andrew Cunningham commented.
“Furthermore we have also taken advantage of market conditions

to make well-priced acquisitions which we anticipate will produce good levels of return for our investors in the future."

Specifically, the company is targeting residential acquisitions that have good prospects of long term capital appreciation, high levels of reversionary potential, development or refurbishment potential and produce attractive yields.

In the four month period, Grainer completed residential sales of £49.4m, and it has a further £26.4m in solicitors' hands / exchanged. For the first 10-months of the financial year, the company has completed sales worth £128.4m, and its pipeline is worth £154.8m.

Grainger’s managed market-rented fund has increased its net asset value by 4.7%, from 64p to 67p. Furthermore, the company highlighted that it is currently investigating options to increase the size of the fund, due to “growing investor interest in the market rented sector”.