Property disposal doesn't signal London market exit: Sinarmas

Singapore

SINARMAS Land's disposal of a Grade A office building in London's West End last Friday, just one-and-a-half years after acquiring it, appeared like a move contrarian to the red-hot sentiment in the London commercial property market, where capital values are expected to appreciate going into 2015.

But Sinarmas executive director Robin Ng told The Business Times that the group, controlled by the Indonesian Widjaja family, is not exiting the market. It had agreed to sell the New Brook Buildings, located in the centre of Covent Garden, simply because the price which a property fund offered for it - £113.4 million (S$233.4 million) - equalled about seven years in rental payment and was too good to pass up.