Inside the BBC’s new Salford offices from David Quinn on Vimeo.

Estates Gazette
19/04/2008

Home sweet home LPC Living is targeting first-time buyers and families in Salford with a scheme that offers affordable housing and a shared ownership plan. David Quinn reports

As residential development goes, nothing sums up the gritty romance of the north like a row of terraced houses under glowering skies and no row of terraced houses sums up the gritty romance of Manchester like Coronation Street.

The soap, based in the fictional suburb of Weatherfield, has been a fixture on television screens since 1960 and some say it was the real Coronation Street, in the Ordsall area of Salford, that inspired the drama.

For any residential developer, working in an area that is so rich in history is sure to require a sensitive approach. Luckily for all concerned, LPC Living is leaving the architecture of Coronation Street well alone in its £150m plan to transform Ordsall with a mix of family-orientated, private-sector housing.

LPC – owned by investor Pervaiz Naviede (see box, below) – signed a development agreement with Salford city council to regenerate the whole of Ordsall in May 2006. The deal covers a 180-acre site from the eastern edge of Salford Quays, heading west towards Manchester city centre.

In need of a transformation

Ordsall has missed out on the razzmatazz residential development seen less than a mile away in Manchester. It remains a deprived area thanks to rapid de-industrialisation and consequent high unemployment and social unrest following the closure of Salford docks in the late 20th century.

But despite initial appearances, its edge-of-city-centre location should have proved attractive to developers.

However, LPC faced no rivals in its attempt to work up an agreement with the council and its chairman, 60-year-old Warren Smith, was spurred on to get involved partly through conversations with local residents.

“Old ladies came up to me and asked why we were investing here. They said ‘it’s a wasteland’,” says Smith, who clearly has great personal affection for the area. “But they also said they liked it in Ordsall and wanted to live here. My view is that if they wanted to live here, then why wouldn’t anyone else?”

He adds: “This site is ideal. It’s right between Salford and Manchester, which are two of the biggest economic generators in the North of England.”

As a result of the agreement between LPC Living and Salford council, Ordsall will get £150m of investment, almost all of it coming from LPC in exchange for exclusive development rights.

Community facilities

Some 800 new homes are proposed, as well as new retail facilities and public amenities. The company has also put £2.3m into the construction of a new primary school.

Since signing the deal, LPC has been boosted by Peel Holdings’ MediaCity:UK development at neighbouring Salford Quays, which is expected to bring thousands of new creative sector workers into the area, including 1,500 with BBC.

LPC has completed residential schemes at Gresham Mill and Quay 5, which pre-dated the agreement with Salford. Since then, it has developed Radclyffe Mews, a development of 34 houses all sold off-plan in November 2006, and has begun work on the 260-unit Hulton Square.

Wandering around Ordsall, it becomes clear that the area is an architectural mish-mash. The Henry Lord-designed New Barracks estate is filled with the kind of tall, red-brick terraces that once dominated the area.

Built between 1900 and 1904 on the site of a former infantry barracks, the estate includes Coronation Street and Salford Lads Club, made famous thanks to an iconic photo on the sleeve of the Smiths’ 1986 album, The Queen is Dead.

But much of Ordsall was razed to the ground in clearance programmes during the 1960s. Grand old terraces were replaced with a mixture of cheap, low-density council houses and a small number of tower blocks. In some places the cleared buildings were not replaced at all, leaving conspicuous open spaces.

Much of Ordsall is dominated by social rented housing. LPC’s masterplan is focused on bringing back more of a mix of tenures by providing housing for owner-occupiers.

“We are in Ordsall for the long-term. We want the houses to be occupied rather than vast swathes left empty,” says LPC’s development and development director Simon Ashdown. “We want the streets to be active and we want Ordsall to benefit.”

As this statement indicates, LPC has a more touchy-feely approach to development than many of housebuilders. The company talks proudly about its commitment to young families and first-time buyers and attracted headlines for its policy of turning away buy-to-let investors at Quay 5. It also offers local people the chance to buy at its schemes some six weeks before the general public.

LPC has pioneered its shared equity scheme called Launchpad, which covers 20% of the units at Hulton Square. This involves LPC offering buyers an interest-free loan on 25% of the value of the property. Buyers secure a standard mortgage on the rest.

Ease for new buyers

Unlike a shared ownership scheme, it means occupiers are not left paying rent on part of their home and no distinction is made between the homes offered within the scheme and the development as a whole, which means Launchpad buyers are spread throughout the development.

Ashdown says take-up for has been good and that making the offer to buyers remains at the company’s discretion.

“We want the right people taking up the offer,” he says. “We want graduates, first-time buyers, local key workers and young families from the M5 postcode.”

Of course, there are sound business reasons for targeting owner-occupiers, especially first-time buyers, as Smith explains. “We’ve always preferred to stay in this market because the buy-to-let market has never been as sustainable, in bulk sales especially,” he says.

“There’s a need to equate house prices with average earnings. First-time buyers have been paying five or six times their annual earnings and that isn’t sustainable. But if there is a downturn, we know there will still be first-time buyers in the market.”

So far, the strategy of appealing to younger, local buyers seems to be working. Of the first phase of Hulton Square, which was launched off-plan last August, 68 of the 73 units have been sold. Of these, 33 went to first-time buyers, while 42 were bought by people under the age of 29. A total of 23 were sold to people already living in Ordsall.

Valuable goodwill

LPC is also closely focused on community initiatives and is taking a lead on a £1m fundraising for the aforementioned Lads club, which has since been renamed Salford Lads’ and Girls’ Club.

Its engagement with the local community extends to environmental and anti-litter campaigns, although again, the purpose is not entirely altruistic. Marketing director Jonathan Drake says such programmes provide valuable goodwill.

They lessen the chances of anti-social behaviour around new developments and promote respect for the company’s schemes among local young people.

It is clear that LPC’s thinking, with its focus on the social aspects of development, is a little outside the ordinary. The company’s emotionally potent formula for success is decidedly more romantic than it is gritty, but remains northern all the same.

And while that might be met with scepticism in some quarters, there’s no doubt that Smith and his team are creating a product that is carefully and cleverly geared towards its unique geography.

Side panels

LPC Living

LPC Living is owned by investor Pervaiz Naviede and his family trust, which is active in the UK, Germany, Switzerland and Dubai. While Naviede – who is ranked 158 in the 2007 EG Rich List with an estimated fortune of £150m – is sometimes involved with the company, the day-to-day running is handled by chairman Warren Smith and his team.

The company was formed in 2003, although Naviede and Smith had been investing in residential property since the mid-1980s through their Legendary Property Company vehicle. Its focus had been on acquiring and refurbishing rundown tower blocks and by 2002 more than a dozen had been completed in the North West.

The move into new-build property came at the start of the decade when four tower blocks were bought in Kirkby on Merseyside. Realising that there was little immediate call for 300 refurbished flats, Smith and Naviede decided two of the blocks should be demolished and replaced with new family homes.

By this time, LPC was already negotiating with Salford council over Ordsall. It secured an exclusivity agreement with Salford for Ordsall’s regeneration in spring 2006. Future plans include Hulton Square in Ordsall, where work is under way on a scheme with 103 townhouses and 157 flats, priced from £80,000 for a one-bed flat to £165,000 for a three-bed house with garage.

Sizing up against new housing targets

Much has been made recently about the size of new housing, particularly schemes aimed at families. English Partnerships drew up new guidelines last year – including a 549 sq ft minimum for one-bed flats and 1,001 sq ft minimum for three-bed units – which many new developments are still failing to meet. LPC stresses that its larger three-bed units exceed these targets, although some other types of units fall a little short. In its defence, Ashdown says LPC’s schemes are “15-20% larger” than those of rival developers, while EP is actually providing funding for part of Hulton Square through its first-time buyers initiative.

Estates Gazette

17/11/2007

Ahead of the pack Urban Splash is not going mainstream. On the contrary, the rest of the property industry is catching up. David Quinn reports.

Urban Splash has never been a classic property company. Renowned for unusual conversions andcutting-edge architecture – and setup by a man who made his name selling posters to students in Manchester’s Affleck’s Palace – the company appears outside the norm.

But Urban Splash is colliding with the mainstream. Not because of an abandonment of its principles, but because the rest of the property industry is beginning to catch up.

“I never think of Urban Splash as a maverick company,” says co-founder, chairman and erstwhile poster retailer Tom Bloxham, glugging on a Diet Coke in his minimalist Castlefield office. “The world is conspiring to come towards us. Big commercial developers are looking at what we’re doing. We’re not a maverick at the edge. We’re the direction the property industry is travelling in.”

The point is illustrated by the answer Bloxham gives when asked what characterises Urban Splash as a company. Ten years ago, his reply – “good design and architecture, a mix of uses and tenures, regeneration” – might have sounded a little left field. Today, it doesn’t.

Deputy chief executive Nick Johnson adds that “punk culture” has influenced Urban Splash’s work. “We encourage people to use their own personality to influence the decisions they make,” he says.

The environmental agenda is also a key concern, but Johnson says he has no time for “gling” – meaning “green bling”. He reasons that, if you can see a green feature such as a wind turbine on a building “it isn’t doing anything”, and professes a preference for the “unsexy stuff”, such as combined heat and power systems.

Sizeable premium

The growth of the Urban Splash brand is such that Johnson readily admits the developer can charge a sizeable premium for its product – up to 15% at Chips, its 142-unit residential scheme in New Islington, Manchester, designed by Will Alsop.

It is difficult to imagine any developer other than Urban Splash delivering a scheme called Chips, which is so named because it looks like three chips lying on their side. Bloxham, however, rejects the idea that the company has become overly associated with outlandish developments during its 14-year history.

“You can’t define a typical Urban Splash scheme,” he says. “We get sent opportunities for Victorian-mill conversions, and people say, ‘This would be ideal for Urban Splash’. But there would have to be something really special about it for us to do something like that today.”

Instead, the developer has recently turned its attention to unloved concrete tower blocks, the product of outdated “cities in the sky” slum-clearance programmes of the 1960s.

How can Urban Splash create demand for this type of living accommodation when history seems to show that nobody wants it?

Bloxham believes a re-evaluation of such buildings is necessary.

“The reason these things failed is because of a lack of maintenance and poor management, rather than intrinsic problems with the buildings themselves,” he says.

Bloxham also believes it is “incredibly wasteful to knock down a building”, and would rather use what is there.

This preference for recycling was followed at Chimney Pot Park in Salford where, instead of demolishing the terraced houses on the site, Urban Splash elected to turn them “upside-down” by creating anopen-plan living space on the first floor, backing on to a raised outdoor space.

Despite its ingenuity, the English Partnerships-backed scheme is arguably Urban Splash’s only brush with bad publicity, after complaints from locals that they could not afford the £99,500 finished product.

“The issue revolved around a statement about homes for £50,000, which was made five years ago and got into the press,” says Johnson. “The market has obviously moved on since then. If we were to sell at that price, it would have required much more public funding.”

Grant funding

Within the property industry, those who do not know much about the company all say one thing: that, as in Salford, Urban Splash has a mastery of the process needed to secure grant funding. Bloxham says that while this could be true of some of its schemes, many others required no contribution from the public purse.

“In Manchester, there’s no public funding needed anymore in the city centre. All our recent schemes in Liverpool are happening without funding, whereas 15 years ago, when no one else was doing anything in the Ropewalks area, it was needed,” he says.

As the mainstream collides with Urban Splash’s way of thinking, some have ventured to suggest the company could make a compelling purchase for one of the giants of the industry. But Bloxham, who owns 70.9% of Urban Splash, shrugs the idea off.

“I love doing what I do – taking blighted, ugly sites and creating objects of beauty,” he says. “If I did sell out, I’d probably put all my money into property, so there wouldn’t be much point.”

For now, Bloxham’s empire looks set to keep on growing. The rest of the property industry may be on Urban Splash’s tail, but he is keen to keep ahead of the pack.

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Splashing across the Mersey

Urban Splash is undertaking 12 projects in Liverpool from its offices on Fleet Street in the city centre.

Its biggest scheme in the city is the Great George Street development, where 700 homes are planned in what Bill Maynard, head of the firm’s Liverpool office, describes as “five big phases”.

It is a far cry from Urban Splash’s beginnings in the city. Maynard, a former Liverpool council planner, confesses that he “laughed” when Urban Splash founder Tom Bloxham purchased the Palace complex on Slater Street with proposals to turn it into “the Covent Garden of the north”.

But when Bloxham linked up with Urban Splash’s other co-founder, Jonathan Falkingham, to purchase several more buildings in the Concert Square area, Maynard became convinced of the growth potential and came on board.

The company is working up £60m plans for the conversion of the Littlewoods building off Edge Lane into 250 flats, a hotel and commercial space.

It was also recently selected to transform the disused ABC cinema on Lime Street into a hotel and restaurant.

“Lime Street is an interesting part of town,” says Maynard. “The local authority and English Partnerships are keen to see something happen because it’s the gateway intothe city.”

Other schemes in Liverpool include the Matchworks office scheme in Speke and the conversion of St Peter’s Church on Duke Street into the footballers’ wives-favoured Alma de Cuba bar.

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New Islington: ‘Poundbury on acid’

Perhaps Urban Splash’s most significant scheme, and the one that has defined its ethos, is New Islington in east Manchester, where the company was selected as lead developer in 2000.

New Islington is designed to be mixed-use, sustainable and architecturally innovative. Once completed, it will include 1,700 homes, retail and leisure facilities, 1m sq ft of public open space and a raft of community facilities, including a school.

The company’s deputy chief executive Nick Johnson describes New Islington as “tradition with a twist”, and emphasises its credentials as a sustainable community.

“The constituent parts are parks, canals, a surgery, a primary school, a row of shops – there’s nothing new in that,” he says.

Perhaps surprisingly, Johnson compares Islington with the Prince Charles-backed and critically panned Poundbury development in Dorset.

“It’s Poundbury on acid,” he says, half-jokingly. “The essence of a sustainable community is the same the world over. We all have human needs that need to be satisfied. But we give it a devilish twist. We add a bit of adventure.”

A staunch Blairite and supporter of the Iraq War, Hazel Blears MP is forthright and enthusiastic about the ongoing regeneration of Salford. David Quinn reports

Salford’s Working Class Movement Library prides itself on ignoring the “conventional history” of “kings, queens, generals and political leaders”. As such, the red-brick building at 51 The Crescent might not necessarily be the kind of place you would expect to find a fervently Blairite cabinet minister.

But Salford MP Hazel Blears, the Blairite in question, has her constituency office there. In the next room, posters, badges and mugs dating from the 1980s miners’ strikes, with slogans such as “Defend Union Rights Picket!” and “Coal Not Dole”, are abundant. Perhaps the fact that this spiky, Old Labour-infused trade union paraphernalia is locked away in a glass case an antique collection of interesting but irrelevant curiosities is significant.

It certainly presents a contrast with Blears’ unflinching and unapologetic New Labour persona, which is seen and heard so often on TV and radio. A staunch defender of the war in Iraq and the government’s controversial anti-terror legislation, she can accurately be described as an arch-loyalist of the government.

As she explains to EG, Blears is keen to put local communities at the heart of regeneration efforts especially regarding the vast changes taking place in her own constituency.

Blears is minister without portfolio, a role previously held by such heavyweights as Peter Mandelson, Charles Clarke and John Reid. In person, she is both relentlessly upbeat and also, on occasion, disarmingly forthright. Her enthusiasm for the ongoing regeneration of Salford is obvious, but it is clear that not every aspect of the process gets her seal of approval.

“Regeneration is always about a lot more than bricks and mortar,” says Blears. “If you look at the Ladywell flats in Salford, they were redeveloped four times, but after each time they went back to being a horrible place to live. Physical regeneration can be important, but you need to tackle crime and anti-social behaviour, otherwise you are wasting your money.”

Changing perceptions

With a background at the Home Office that included community safety, policing and anti-social behaviour briefs, Blears’ standpoint is understandable. She is happy to acknowledge the “impact on people’s confidence” when their neighbourhoods are transformed by physical regeneration. But she pauses a little awkwardly when asked about the benefits to the community of Salford Quays, with its modern office blocks, half-million pound luxury apartments and, latterly, the Lowry arts centre.

“It’s been hugely important for our image outside Salford. It’s helped to shift perceptions enormously,” she begins, before opting for a change of tack. “I was concerned that the Lowry would really just be for middle-class people from Cheshire but that’s not the case. People in Salford are quite proud of the Lowry, and the Triathlon World Cup event has brought in thousands of people. So it’s perhaps not brought about the social division people may have been concerned about.”

One might, then, describe development at the Quays as having a positive “trickle-down” effect on local communities. But Blears frowns at this wording and, as if reminded of the political legacy that led to the slogan-filled relics in the next room, says she “hates that phrase” because “it’s very Thatcherite”. Instead, she says she prefers to look at the development of Salford Quays, and physical regeneration in general, as a “virtuous circle”.

“Developers are more likely to want to come into other parts of Salford because of the success of Salford Quays,” she explains.

The Quays is earmarked for a major relocation by the BBC in 2010, as part of Peel Holdings’ MediaCity:UK scheme, which is being championed by local urban regeneration company Central Salford. But the BBC is saying the move may not happen unless it can get a 1.8% rise above inflation in the licence fee settlement something to which the Department of Culture, Media & Sport has yet to agree.

Blears is, of course, keen to see the move happen, and says she is “lobbying intensively” on the issue. Her front-line government role gives her an inside track on the negotiations over the licence fee, although she stresses that she will make no formal intervention, other than as a local MP.

She makes it clear she is unimpressed with the BBC’s prevarication over the licence fee settlement and its attempts to use Salford as a bargaining chip in the negotiations. “It is entirely inappropriate,” she says. “The BBC said they would come here. The proposal we put to them is a fantastic opportunity for them and for us. They should fulfil the commitment they have made. It’s essential that
the scheme as envisaged happens in full. MediaCity is not just about the BBC coming here, that’s just one part. The scheme as a whole needs to have that integrity. It’s not sensible to pare it back.”

The MP is full of praise for the Central Salford URC, which, as well as wooing the BBC to Salford, has begun a series of proposals for the regeneration of Salford’s historic city core (see p182). The regeneration of the A6 Chapel Street, to reinforce links with central Manchester, is central to the URC’s proposals, and Blears approves.

“The A6 corridor is key,” she says. “It’s important we get the best high-quality development along Chapel Street. But we need to progress quickly because the contrast between the A6 and Manchester city centre is dramatic.”

Blears does not believe it is necessary for Salford to ape the offer of central Manchester. She notes that when she was growing up in Salford, a trip “into town” meant Manchester, rather than Salford.

“The URC’s approach, of ‘making Salford beautiful’ is the right way to go,” says Blears. “We are different,
we have lots of green space and yet we are close to a major metropolitan centre. You play to your strengths, rather than becoming a mirror image of a bustling city centre.”

Warning shot

She compares the relationship between Manchester and Salford with that between Minneapolis and St Paul in the US, joking that it sounds “romantic”.

The interview concludes with what Blears happily labels a “warning shot” to property developers about the role of local communities in regeneration. She confesses that EG is not her “usual reading material” but is clearly keen to ram home her agenda to those for whom it is.

“Throughout all the regeneration in Salford, the thing that’s made it successful and sustainable is the involvement of local people. You can’t regenerate just by building great buildings,” she says. “If you invest in local people you get better results and transformational, long-term change.”

The office of Peel Holdings, one of the UK’s largest landlords and property developers, is perched in what a helpful assistant calls “Peel Dome”, high above the consumerist temple that is the Trafford Centre.

Once inside, there is a conspicuous lack of mahogany panelling, shag pile carpet and the other various trappings associated with mega-landowners of the sort Peel undoubtedly is. Lest we forget, this is a company with assets totalling £2.5bn, whose majority shareholder, John Whittaker, is thought to be worth £929m, which puts him at number seven on this year’s EG Rich List.

On entering one of several boardrooms, one is confronted with a couple of huge maps illustrating Peel’s landholdings. On one side, a plan shows that the company owns virtually everything along the Manchester Ship Canal.

It is undoubtedly a lot of land, and that’s only a small portion of it. The company owns 20,000 acres of land and 5m sq ft of investment property across the UK and in Bermuda, the Bahamas and Spain.

The famous purchase

“It’s been built up with acquisitions over the past 20 years,” explains director Ed Burrows, who has been with the company for the past 17 years.

“We do buy and sell land, but large acreages have been acquired by purchasing other companies.”

The most famous of these purchases was Peel’s acquisition of the Manchester Ship Canal Company in 1987.

But the firm hasn’t just sat on its landholding, having invested over £300m in the Ship Canal and its environs during the past 12 years. Add to that the £350m the firm has thrown at the Trafford Centre and a further £300m invested by the centre’s occupiers themselves, and you have a total of well over £1bn invested in the Ship Canal Corridor, all spurred by Peel.

The company has further plans for the corridor in the shape of Port Salford, a proposed multimodal freight terminal on a 200-acre brownfield site close to Barton Airfield in Irlam. Salford council is considering the proposals.

At the eastern end of the Ship Canal sits Salford Quays, where Peel owns most of the remaining development land. The company’s latest plan for the area is the 15-acre Quays Point. Peel already has planning permission for a 1m sq ft office and residential development on the site, which is opposite the Imperial War Museum North. It plans a “Third Grace” landmark building to complement the Daniel Libeskind-designed Museum, and the Lowry.

“Salford Quays has a parallel with London Docklands,” says Burrows.

“It has a similar relationship to Manchester city centre as Docklands has to the City of London: similar facilities, and Metrolink tying it to the city.”

The other major site at Salford Quays is known as Pomona and is a 26-acre plot at the eastern end of the quays. Peel has submitted an application to develop 500 flats. It will not build these itself.

As with Quays Point, once Peel has obtained planning permission, it will sell to a residential developer. Crosby Homes, City Lofts and Millennium have recently bought large plots from Peel in this way, and are at various stages of development. At the moment, Peel has no plan to cut out the middle man and go into residential development itself.

“Peel doesn’t build houses,” says Burrows. “That’s a specialist market. Our policy is to maximise planning permission on a site, then sell it on.”

But Peel is a sophisticated landowner, having realised the potential of a long-term approach. It has donated £12m, plus a significant landholding, to the Imperial War Museum North, as well as in excess of £5m of land to the Metrolink tram system. These may seem generous acts, but the fact that these two projects have led to a huge increase in visitors to the area, as well as improved national and international perceptions of Salford Quays, has caused a huge growth in land values.

The long-term view

Perhaps Peel’s commitment to the long haul was behind Whittaker’s decision to take the company private in August. Although Burrows prefers not to speculate on the reasons, he does say: “The company has always had a long-term view.”

Whittaker is said to be a very “hands on” chairman who takes a strong interest in the day-to-day affairs of the business. He has four children, three of whom work for the firm. The other is expected to join after graduating from university. The eldest is Mark, who has been with Peel for 10 years. He is in charge of the Peel Investments wing of the business, which holds and trades a mixed portfolio of property across the country, and has an annual rental income of £40m.

He is responsible for letting Venus, the 91,500 sq ft office building the firm has developed in an area it is calling Trafford Quays, opposite the Trafford Centre. Half of the building was let earlier this year to medical supplies company SSL International.

“We see Trafford Quays as a new business location. We’re trying to create a mixture of uses between offices and leisure, and that’s why we developed Venus,” says Whittaker.

“The strength of the location lies in the fact that we have secured a 45,000 sq ft letting within three months of practical completion. We want to continue to strengthen Trafford Quays in response to market demand.”

At present, much of the land around Trafford Quays does not have the relevant planning permission to permit Peel to embark on this project, but the firm is hopeful it won’t be long in coming.

Peel also recently launched Peel Business Parks. Around 2,000 acres of land have been siphoned off into this venture, much of it located near the four airports the company owns in Liverpool, Teesside, Sheffield and at the former RAF Finningley, also known as Robin Hood Doncaster Sheffield Airport. However, there are 20 different sites in total, in areas as diverse as Wakefield, Ellesmere Port and the M3 corridor.

Matthew Fitton, property development manager, who is tasked with developing the business parks, says: “It’s a case of pulling everything together under one brand. We’re currently working to label everything up over the next 18 months.”

Fitton says Salford Quays has been excluded from the Peel Business Parks exercise, although Port Salford, if given the go-ahead, will fall under the new umbrella.

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The Peel Empire

Land and property Includes Peel Investments and Peel Business Parks. Schemes include Salford Forest Park, a £100m scheme on the drawing board, which could see horse racing return to Manchester. Also includes land at Salford Quays, the 1.4m sq ft Trafford Centre, Trafford Quays, Port Salford and Gloucester Quays

Peel Ports Includes the Manchester Ship Canal, Clydeport (Scotland’s only Atlantic-facing port), and the Glasgow Harbour Development

Peel Airports Liverpool John Lennon airport, Teeside International airport, Sheffield City airport and Robin Hood Doncaster International airport at the former RAF Finningley airbase

Total holdings 5m sq ft of investment property and 20,000 acres of land worth £2.5bn